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T 1 M O TFT Y LtARY

was, at the time, a successful robot

respected at Harvard,

clean-cut, witty, and, in that inert culture, unusually creative.

had attained the highest ambition of the young American intellectual, I was totally cut off from the body and senses. My clothes had been obediently selected to fit the young pro-

Though

fessional image.
tinely listened to

Even

after

one hundred drug sessions


martinis, ate

rou-

pop music, drank


art

what was put

before me.
I

had "appreciated"

by pushing

my body

around to "sa-

cred places," but this tourism had nothing to do with direct

nervous system was cocooned in symbols; the event was always second-hand. Art was an academic concept, an institution. The idea that one should live one's life
aesthetic sensation.

My

as a

work

of art

had never occurred


psilocybin,
I

to me.
in Flora Lu's

After

we took

sat

on the couch

Elysian chamber, letting

my

right cerebral hemisphere slowly

Lu and Maynard the yoga of attention. Each mostarted teaching me eroticism ment was examined for sensual possibility. The delicious grace
open up to
direct sensual reception. Flora

of moving one's hand, not as part of a learned survival se-

quence, but for kinesthetic joy.

The
Delicious Grace

of Moving

One's Hand
The Collected Sex Writings

Timothy Leary

Thunder's Mouth Press

New York

Published by

Thunder's

Mouth

Press

841 Broadway, Fourth Floor New York, NY 10003


Copyright
First edition

1998 Futique Trust

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publishers, unless by reviewers who wish to quote brief passages.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Leary,

Timothy Francis, 1920The delicious grace of moving


p.

one's

hand

by Timothy Leary.

1st ed.

cm.
2.

ISBN 1-56025-181-6
1.

Sex

Philosophy.

Hedonism.

3.

Computer

sex.

Title.

HQ23.L43
306.701

1999
dc21

98-37028 CIP
United States of America

Manufactured

in the

Distributed by Publisher's

Group West

1700 Fourth
Berkeley,

Street

CA

94710

(800) 788-3123

Contents

Timothy Leary: Sexual Revolutionary


Author's Introduction: Intelligence
Is

vii

the Ultimate
1

Aphrodisiac

Looking Back
Millbrook
'66:

On

Sex, Consciousness, and LSD

My First Sexual Encounter


Discovering the Source of All Pleasure The Legend of Billy Will

28

32 43

Body
The
Clitoris:

59
1993
Exposure
the

61

Life Is a Southern

69
Elixir

The Long Search for Hedonic Psychology

Male

85

98
105

Pornography
First Official

Act as President
Flynt:

107
1984
108

The Persecution of Larry


Sexy Centerfolds

116
135

The Berkeley Lectures: 1969


Psychedelic Psychology

The Psychedelic Marriage

137 173

Contents

How To

Drop Out

192

The Hedonic Revolution The Hedonic Society of the Future

223

242
263

Cybersex
Platonic Love
Electronic Sex

Becomes Pretty Real

'

265 272
291

Bibliography

VI

Timothy Leary: Sexual Revolutionary

Leary loved to turn you on.

More than any


especially

TIMOTHY other major public


sexual pleasure

figure of the

20th century, Timothy Leary

beheved that embracing the experience of pleasure

was

the highest

aim of humanity.

Many

times,
it.

over several adventurous decades, he risked everything to prove

What

sent this Springfield, Massachusetts-born

boy turned Haratmosphere of

vard professor on such a world-class Dionysian quest? The roots


of Leary's ecstatic search
his youth,

may

lie

in the repressive

and

his tragic early marriage.

hibition began.
father

Timothy Leary was born on October 22, 1920 the year proHe was the son of an alcoholic, abusive military
and a devoutly
mother with a "fanatically of men and sexuality." At twelve, his father
Irish Catholic

religious distrust

abandoned him, leaving him a


It

single hundred-dollar

bill.

wasn't long before he began testing the limits himself. By 1940, at 20 years of age, Leary left West Point after having been made an example of with a humiliating nine-month code of silence for drinking. His next

move, to the University of Alabama,


for sleeping at a girls' dor-

was cut short when he was expelled


mitory.

vu

Timothy Leary
Leary was drafted, became a corporal, married Marianne
Busch, and completed a master's in psychology at Washington State University. As a doctoral candidate at UC Berkeley and a director of psychological research for Kaiser Permanente Hospital,

he became widely

known

for his published

work on

trans-

actional psychology,
Personality,
Play.
2l

notably The Interpersonal Diagnosis of

respected precursor to Eric Berne's

Games People

Over a decade before the summer of Love, Leary was conif

sidered a masterful, breakthrough psychological theorist.

But
sonal

interpersonal psychology

was Leary's

forte, his

own
in

per-

life

was

in turmoil.

As Charles W. Slack describes

Tim-

othy Leary: the Madness of the Sixties

&

Me, hard-drinking

Timothy and Marianne Leary had


an unusual
affair for the

1950s, involving flaunted infidelity


it,

on both

sides.

At the end of

they were both to be found

acting out frequently at


ties,

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woo//" parwhich would climax with Tim and Marianne Leary in
other's. People

arms not each

who knew them

then got the

impression they were trying to drive each other crazy. The


kids (children Jackie and Susan) ran wild.

On

the

in the garage,

fering

morning of his 35th birthday, Tim discovered Marianne dead by suicide in the family car, asphyxiated. Suffrom acute post-partum depression, she left him to parent
children.

two young

On
had

a self-imposed sabbatical, he

moved with
While

his kids to

Eu-

rope, and

became

violently

ill

in Spain.

sick,

Leary

who

yet to try a single psychedelic substance

had

his first taste

of fever-induced satori:
"all the

ropes of

my

"With a sudden snap," he later wrote, social self were gone. I was a 3 8 -year-old

male animal with two cubs. High, completely free." Like novelist William S. Burroughs, who accidentally shot and killed his first

vni

Timothy Leary

wife, Leary's tragedy forced


his entire

him

into a midlife reassessment of

worldview.

In 1957, Leary returned to Berkeley

and married
last

his

second wife,

Mary

"Del" Gorman. The marriage didn't

and Leary

picking up a three-year post at

more than a year, Harvard had be-

come a ladies' man at the dawn of the swinging sexual revolution. As Slack puts it, "Plenty of good-lookers came to be served." Leary, however, found himself with a new challenge:
111

1960,

moved
faculty.

to

Cambridge, Massachusetts, to join


I

the

Harvard

My sexual situation was changed.

was
of

a 40-year-old single person facing, once again, the

thrills

romance and
At
it?)

spills
I

of the mating ground.

this point

found that

my

sexuality
I

was very

elitist

and

selective.

(how shall I put no longer felt the incesany consenting

sant, throbbing teenage desire to fuck

warm

body

in the vicinity.

one-night stand could be a lust or a


the

bust depending on
tional state,

my feelings toward and my period of heat.

woman, my emo-

Leary became obsessed with the problems of impotence and its psychological implications. He started an exhaustive research of
aphrodisiacs from
all

over the world.

To

find out

more about

these matters,

read extensively

on the
chnical,
uality

subject and talked to

my

friends in the psychiatric,


I

and personality departments.


not an automatic

learned that male sex-

is

macho

scene.

The male

erotic

response turned out to be a most complex situation. More than two-thirds of the male population over the age of 35
reported
less

than perfect control over their desires. Adult

IX

Timothy Leary
males seemed to have cycles and rhythms and
delicate
sensitivities

all sorts

of
the

that

are

usually

attributed

to

"weaker sex."

Concurrent with but separate from his obsessive quest for a functioning aphrodisiac, Leary had been told about a miraculous

mushroom

that could induce religious enlightenment.

That sum-

mer, after only eight months at Harvard, Leary foUow^ed the cue
of creativity psychologist Frank Barron, and v^ent to Cuernavaca, Mexico, to experiment v^ith "so-called sacred mushrooms." After

one

trip

Leary v^as sold, and immediately returned to Harvard to

begin a research program called The Psilocybin Project. Ironically, even for Leary, the connection between mind expanstill not so obvious. As Leary remiabout the early days of LSD research at Harvard, "we learned, to our dismay, that hip pleasure-seekers in Las Vegas, Beverly Hills, and Aspen were saying LSD (a psychedelic drug

sion

and body ecstasy was

nisces

none of us had yet


coveries

tried)

meant

"Let's Strip

Down." These

dis-

came

as a delicious

shock to our prudish academic

minds."
wasn't until a jazz trumpeter named Maynard Ferguson and his beatnik wife Flora Lu hooked up Leary with a sensual MorIt

occan cover

girl

model named Malaca that Leary made the jump

from

cerebral/spiritual

LSD

use to all-out sensual/sexual/psyche-

delic experimentation.
is

beautifully

documented

Leary was "turned on" to say the least, as in "Discovering the Source of All Plea-

sure," in this volume:

We

found no problem maneuvering the limbs, tentacles, and delightful protuberances with which we were miraculously
equipped in the transparent honey-liquid zero-gravity atmoThis sphere that surrounded, bathed, and sustained us
. . .

was

my

first
It

sexual experience under the influence of psystartled

chedelics.

me

to learn that in addition to being

Timothy Leary

instruments of philosophic revelation, mystical unity, and


evolutionary insight, psychedelic drugs were very pow^erful

aphrodisiacs
.

Malaca was

upstairs taking a bubble

bath

His search had ended. Once he made the connection between


the psychedelic

and the

erotic

it

became the forefront of Leary's

agenda, and he fought to publicly sexualize the acid experience. "There is no question that LSD is the most powerful aphrodisiac
ever discovered," Leary announced, to the great displeasure of many of his Harvard colleagues. In 1963, Leary and his associate

Richard Alpert were tossed out of Harvard, the first faculty members to be kicked out since Ralph Waldo Emerson. The party had
begun.

Leary moved the operation, formally

known

as the

League for

Spiritual Discovery (LSD), to a millionaire patron's palatial estate


in Millbrook, New York. On Marshall MacLuhan's suggestion, he coined a pop phrase for mass ingestion Tune in. Turn on,

Drop out

and encouraged young people

to join the psychedelic

nation. In 1964, he married a third time, to the glamorous

Nena

von Schlebrugge, daughter of Baroness von Schlebrugge. Nena was a jetset television commercial model for Swedish cigars, featured in Harper's Bazaar, "suited for spring" in "Davidow's short, cuffed-sleeve suit of coral-and-green Italian cotton at Bon-

wit Teller." As Harper's put


at a youthful age, so

it,

Nena "became

a seasoned traveler

today

it's

only natural that she spend

much

of her time jetting from her

New York base to various and sundry


bliss:

European and Asian destinations." It was a heady new form of domestic


perstar and
riage,
it

the acid guru su-

his wild, lysergic


last.

trophy wife. Like his previous

mar-

didn't

As Dr. Slack describes


Sixties,

the

Madness of the

it in Timothy Leary, and Me, "Millbrook was beginning to

XI

Timothy Leary
returning from

look
India,

like the

Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

Upon

Tim and Nena

were separated pending divorce." Perhaps

not entirely unaffected by her experiences at Millbrook, Nena von Schlebrugge w^ent on to marry Robert A. F. Thurman, Professor of Tibetan-Buddhist studies at

Columbia, the

first

Western

Tibetan Buddhist
of actress

Uma

ordained by the Dalai Lama, and father Thurman. Today, she is the treasurer of Tibet

Monk

House.

fluence

Meanwhile, Timothy Leary's notoriety, fame, and sphere of inwere ballooning out of control. He celebrated by marrying

Rosemary Woodruff, two times in a row. The first ceremony, at sunrise in Joshua Tree, was filmed and directed by Ted Markland of Bonanza, and featured an entire congregation gassed on acid. The second ceremony, at Millbrook,
actress/model/stewardess

was conducted by Freaky Bill Haines, hip guru of a cult called "the Neo- American Church." Rosemary was Leary's true partner and psychedelic soul-mate during his most public, turbulent years. In "The Berkeley Lectures," included in this volume, Leary regularly refers to her as a

source of ideas and inspiration. She

was

a guide at Millbrook

and

a seminar instructor for Leary's League for Spiritual Discovery.

Priest of

High LSD, Leary found himself in the sometimes contradictory position of crafting a Healthy New Psychedelic Sexuality. LSD, he insisted, could cure impotence, cement relationships, and initiate

As both a married man

in his late '40s

and the

unofficial

none.

hundreds of female orgasms where there previously had been When Playboy sent Alex Haley to interview Leary at Mill-

brook, the author of Roots, perhaps acting on behalf of the magazine's readership, seemed more interested in whether or not LSD

would help

a swinger get chicks into the sack.

PLAYBOY: Are you preaching psychedelic monogamy? LEARY: Well, I can't generalize, but one of the great lessons I've learned from LSD is that every man contains the essence of
xu

Timothy Leary

men and every woman has within her all women. I remember a session a few years ago in which, with horror and
all

ecstasy,

I opened my eyes and looked into Rosemary's eyes and was pulled into the deep pools of her being floating softly

in the center of her

mind, experiencing everything that she


ever had.

was experiencing, knowing every thought she

As

my

eyes were riveted to

change. I saw with gray hair and seamy, wrinkled


a

hers, her face began to melt and her as a young girl, as a baby, as an old woman
face.
I

saw her

as a witch,

Madonna,

a nagging crone, a radiant queen, a Byzantine

virgin, a tired worldly-wise oriental

every sight of

life

repeated a thousand times. She

whore who had seen was all

women,

all

woman,

the essence of female, eyes smiling quiz-

always inviting, "See me, hear with me, join me, merge me, keep the dance going." Now the
zically, resignedly, devilishly,

implications of this experience for sex and mating,

think are

obvious.

It's

because of

this,

not because of moral restrictions

or restraints, that I've been

monogamous

in

my

use of

LSD

over the

last six years.

PLAYBOY: When you

speak of monogamy, do you mean the

complete sexual fidelity to one woman? LEARY: Well, the notion of running around trying to find different mates
is

a very low-level concept.

We

are living in a

world of expanding population in which there are more and more beautiful young girls and boys coming off the assembly line each month. It's obvious that the sexual criteria of the
past are going to be changed and that what's
creatures with our sensory

demanded of
is

and

cellular repertoire

not just

one

affair after

another with one young body after another,

but the exploration of the incredible depths and varieties of your own identity with another. This involves time and com-

mitment to the voyage. There is a certain kind of neurological and cellular fidelity that develops. I have said for many years

now

that in the future the grounds for divorce

would not be

Xlll

Timothy Leary
mate went
for

that your

to

bed with another and bounced around

on a mattress

LSD

session with

an hour or two, but that your mate had an somebody else, because the bonds and the

connections that develop are so powerful.

PLAYBOY:
of

been reported that when you are in the company women, quite a lot of them turn on to you. As a matter of fact, a friend of yours told us that you could have two or
It's

three different

women

a night

if

you wanted

to. Is
I

he right?

LEARY: For

the

most

part, during the last six years,

have lived

very quietly in our research centers. But on lecture tours and


in highly enthusiastic social gatherings, there
is

that a charismatic public figure does generate attraction

no question and

stimulate a sexual response.

PLAYBOY: How often do you return this response? LEARY: Every woman has built into her cells and
her

tissues the

longing for a hero, sage-mythic male, to open up and share own divinity. But casual sexual encounters do not satisfy

this

deep longing.

Any

charismatic person

who

is

conscious

of his or her

own

mythic potency awakens


it

this basic

and pays reverence to

at the level that

is

hunger harmonious and

appropriate at the time. Compulsive body grabbing, however, is rarely the vehicle of such communication.

PLAYBOY: Do you
catalyzed

disapprove of the idea of casual romance,


else

by LSD?
tell

LEARY:

Well, I'm no one to


say,
if

anyone

what

to do. But

would

you use

LSD

to

make out

sexually in the seduc-

then you'll be a very humiliated and embarrassed person, because it's just not going to work. On LSD, her eyes would be microscopic, and she'd see very plainly what you
tive sense,

were up

coming on with some heavy-handed, mustachetwisting routine. You'd look like a consummate ass, and she'd laugh at you, or you'd look like a monster and she'd scream and go into a paranoid state. Nothing good can happen with
to,

XIV

Timothy Leary

LSD

if it's

used crudely or for power or for manipulative pur-

poses.

PLAYBOY:

Suppose you met a girl at a party, developed an immediate rapport, and you both decided to share an LSD trip that same night. Could it work under those circumstances?
that in taking

LEARY: You must remember


else,

LSD

with someone

you and opening yourself up in a very vulnerable manner. If you and the other are ready to do this, there would be an immediate and deep rapport if you took a trip together. Peofenses
ple

are voluntarily relinquishing your personality de-

from the LSD

cult

would be

able to

do

it

upon

a brief
it

meeting, but an inexperienced person would probably find

extremely confusing, and the people might become quite isolated from each other. They might be whirled into the rapture
or confusion of their
that the other person

own
is

inner workings

and forget

entirely

there.

was that of a cosmic diplomatic, the constant battle between regulating square culture, law enLeary's new, visible position

forcement, "the
ple,

LSD

cult," so-called serious psychology, the peo-

and the

press. In '68, President


in

Nixon

called

"The most dangerous man

America," as

Timothy Leary John Lennon wrote

"Come Together"
ifornia.

to help Leary's candidacy for governor of Cal-

caught up with Leary, and he was sentenced to thirty years for possession of less than ten dollars of marijuana. After a few months, he escaped prison with the help of the
finally

The law

Weather Underground, and Rosemary accompanied him on his legendary flight from the law first to Europe, then to Algeria,
where they were
first

protected, then held hostage, by Eldridge

Cleaver's Black Panthers. Ultimately,

Rosemary

left

Leary and

spent the next 25 years underground as a fugitive. She lives free

XV

Timothy Leary
Northern California but, as biographer Robert Forte puts "her adventure remains to be told."

in

it,

In a bizarre twist that seems crazy even for Leary's life, he then returned to the United States, where his next girlfriend, Joanna

Harcourt-Smith, turned out to be a narc, and he landed back in


prison in the spring of 1973. Amazingly, Leary said of her finking him out, "I certainly don't hold it against her. She likes this es-

pionage action.

It

gets her off.

Who am

I,

of
I

all

people, to put

down somebody

else's

turn on? Joanna and

operate on the as. . .

sumption that everybody knows everything anyway nothing and no way to hide." After his release and
There
is still

There

is

their

break

up, Joanna became advisor to the Prime Minister of Grenada.

some controversy as to whether or not Leary himself informed on members of the underground to get a lighter sen-

tence.

Like the mythical Kid Charlemagne, Timothy Leary was officially free in 1976, but in a vastly changed cultural landscape, as
"the day-glo freaks

who

used to paint their face had joined the


it,

human

cariously fluid. Fifty-six years old with

was preno home, no job, no credit, and little credibility. I felt quite alone. It was a great time to start a new career." The former prisoner and acid guru hit the Hollyrace."

As he put

"Once

again,

my

situation

wood
movie

party circuit, logging "several thousand hours at screenings,


sets, chic restaurants,

and swimming pool brunches, attempting to understand how movies are made." Leary met his last wife, movie producer Barbara, in 1978. He
parties,

Malibu

described his post-prison years with Barbara and her young son Zachary as "the most loving, tranquil, most productive of my life.
I

have been

falsely arrested visible

awarded that most


credit card."
still

only once and have recently been symbol of domestic dependability a


of the 1980s on college lecture tours,

He

spent

much

standing up to an ever-oppressive government, speaking out in favor of Cybersex, pornography, and free speech. It was Leary's original and scientifically postulated contention that the
XVI

Timothy Leary
organism, like binary computer code, can be turned OFF or turned ON, in a cosmic rhythm. Once again, Leary was in favor of getting turned on.

human

Leary in 1992, but he remained a vigorous optimist till the end, the "Hope fiend," even celebrating his ov^n death when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 1996. Once again,
left

Barbara

Leary emphasized that the seemingly mundane or frightening could be eroticized and sanctified.
It

was

a long

way from an

alcoholic puritanical Irish Catholic

background,

after a long

hard battle with what he saw to be the


spiritual impotence, for half

culture's great

demons, sensual and

a century in the public spotlight.

time and today, Leary has often been misunderstood as a self-promoting shaman, a drug peddler, a Dr. Feelgood

Both

in his

own

confidence man. In this volume, you will find Timothy Leary's original mix of alarming scientific lucidity, Lenny Bruce-ian wit,
flights

of

sci-fi

fantasy, strands of the history of behavioral psy-

chology, evolutionary theory, social science, and the outrageous


thrills

that psychedelic highs provide.

All of Leary's great obsessions are covered here,

from

DNA to
spir-

LSD, sex to communication, the Aquarian Age to the Information


Age, tribal living to
itual liberation.
Still,

digital stimulation, political

freedom to

this collection of his writing,

years,

is

surprisingly consistent in
IS

its

spanning 30 tumultuous theme: If it FEELS good, it

probably

good

for the self, for the psyche, for the genes, for

the planet, for the soul.

Daniel

Weizmann

xvii

Author's Introduction:
Intelligence
Is

the Ultinnate Aphrodisiac

DELICIOUS GRACE OF MOVING ONE'S HAND

IS

ABOUT METH-

THE ods. Do-It- Yourself techniques for programming that most important sector of life: sexual relations. This book is a distillation of my writings about cybersexuality, personal liberation, and the meaning of life over the last 25 years.

This

is

a periodical, a collection of "highlights," quick film clips


If

of "the great moments."

any.

Is

Bigger Really Better?


employed

Any More?
is

The

editorial tactic

here, condensation, miniaturization,

the Standard Operating Procedure of the Information Age. In a

quantum-digital universe,

RPM

(revelations per minute) are accel-

erated to light-year fractions,

MPS

(megabits per second).

The

basic elements of the universe, according to

quantumdigital
in-

digital physics, are quanta. Invisible bits of

compressed

program. These elements of pure (01) information contain


credibly detailed algorithms to

program

potential sequences for

15 billion years. And still running. These information- jammed units have only one hardware-external function. All they do is
flash

OFF/ON when

the immediate environment triggers a


if:

com-

plex array of

"if-if-if-if

THEN!"

algorithms.

TIMOTHY LEARY
Digital

communication

(i.e.

the operation of the universe) in-

volves massive arrays of these info-units. Trillions of informationpixels flashing to create the
single

momentary hardv^are
electronics, the

reality of

one

atom.
level of

At the basic
is

quantum

more information

alv^ays coded

in the smaller.

The Newtonian-energy-matter equations of the industrial age described a local-mechanical reality in which Bigger was very Better. You remember the catch phrases sung by the old Newtonian,
Heavy-Metal-Dinosaur Marching Band? Force. Momentum. Mass. Energy. Work. Power. Thermo-dynamics. In the industrial
culture,

books were weighty tomes, designed to

last for centuries.


is

In the

Communication Age, so many-much more information packed into so many-much smaller hardware units.

For example, we are suddenly discovering that the human information organ, the two-pound brain, is a biocomputer which processes more information than the 200-pound body.

Another example:

We

realize that the biological information

code, the almost invisible

DNA

chip, keeps

programming and

i.e. generaconstructing improved, organic, computing A billionbrains. and more of better after tion portable generation

alliances,

year-old

DNA

mega-program

is

many-much smarter than

the

shudderingly fragile

here-and-now brain!

And

infinitely smaller!

Your Guide to Smart Loving


The Delicious Grace of Moving One's Hand
as a periodical.
is

best approached

A storehouse about a variety of methods and techhuman


intelligence to sexual intercourse.

niques which apply

In this book, I have tried to apply to the wood-pulp mode some of these principles of cybernetic communication. I holed up in the editing room and scanned some 15,000 pages of my published

Author's Introduction

writings any.

and snipped out "high-lights" of sexual experiences.


of these clips
is

If

Some
ers.

came from magazine


It's

articles.

This book

not a linear read.

a series of retrospective trailflip

When you

start reading, please

browse, graze,

from chan-

nel to chapter.
If

you should

find

two or

three of these mental-appetizers ap-

pealing enough, you are invited to buy or rent or borrow the

mammoth-giant-regular-book-length versions. book stores, libraries, private and public. These


the bibliography.

To

be found at
are fisted in

titles

The message from


is

the sponsors of this book-length periodical

an invitation, an incitement, an encouragement to Think For Yourself and Question Authority. T.F.Y.Q.A. To the extent that

we assume responsibility for programming our minds, the greater emphasis we tend to place on mental performance. If we passively allow others to tell us what to think, then we are helpless victims
of external programming.

Each chapter considers

a traditional or novel

approach to im-

prove your navigational control over your pleasure cruises. Hindu methods for stimulating the 4-hour erection via hypnogogic yantras. A variety of chemical aphrodisiacs with luscious examples of set and setting. Affectionate plagiarism of great writ-

and poets, including moonstruck astronauts. Neuro-linguistic tricks for arousal and practice using computers. Digital erotics. Maps and diagrams for coordinating the righters

brain psychedelic with left-brain cybernetics. Plus a year's supply


of one-liners, bumper-sticker mantras, and T-shirt mottoes for

performing smart loving. The message is about erotic excellence performed with humor

and

style.

Looking Back

Millbrook '66

On

Sex, Consciousness, and

LSD

The reader should be warned


out-of-date.

that this essay is much Our knowledge of PSYCHEDELIC and

CYBERNETIC
all

events have progressed considerably

since this primitive stage in our growth.

And we

have

become more

sensitive to various sexual chauvin1

isms since this primitive year,

966.

TO

UP
ence.

THIS MOMENT, FVE HAD 311 PSYCHEDELIC SESSIONS. was thirty-nine when I had my first psychedeUc experiAt that time, I was a middle-aged man involved in the
I

middle-aged process of dying.

My joy in life, my sensual openness,

my
of

creativity

ago,

at the University of California and at Harvard, of course, feel that I've become an eccentric and a kook. I would

my life my colleagues

downhill. Since that time, six years has been reviewed in almost every dimension. Most
all sliding

were

estimate that fewer than 15 percent of

my professional colleagues

understand and support what Fm doing. The ones who do, as you might expect, tend to be among the younger psychologists. If

you know a person's age, you know what he's going to think and feel about LSD. Psychedelic drugs are the medium of the young.

As you move up

the age scale into the thirties, forties

and

fifties,

TIMOTHY LEARY
fewer and fewer people are open to the possibilities that these
chemicals offer.

To

one of

the person over thirty-five or forty, the word "drug" means two things: doctor-disease or dope fiend-crime. Nothing

you can say to a person who has this neurological fix on the word "drug" is going to change his mind. He's frozen like a Pavlovian dog to this conditioned reflex. To people under twenty-five, on
the other hand, the

word "drug"

refers to a

wide range of mind

benders running from alcohol, energizers, and stupefiers to marijuana and other psychedelic drugs. To middle-aged America, it

may

be synonymous with instant insanity, but to most Americans

under twenty-five, the psychedelic drug means ecstasy, sensual unexperience, revelation, illumination, contact with nature. There's hardly a teenager or young person in the
folding,
religious

United States today who doesn't know at least one young person who has had a good experience with marijuana or LSD. The horizons of the current younger generation, in terms of

expanded

consciousness, are light years

beyond those of their parents. The breakthrough has occurred; there's no going back. The psychedelic battle
is

won.

None

of us yet

knows

exactly

how LSD
being.
It is

can be used for the


a powerful releaser

growth and

benefit of the

human

of energy as yet not fully understood. But when I'm confronted with the possibility that a fifteen-year-old or a fifty-year-old is

going to use a

of energy that he doesn't understand, I'll back the fifteen-year-old every time. Why? Because a fifteen-yearold is going to use a new form of energy to have fun, intensify
love, for curiosity, for personal growth. Many have lost their curiosity, have lost their ability to fifty-year-olds make love, have dulled their openness to new sensations, and would use any form of new energy for power, control, and war-

new form

sensation, to

make

fare.

So

it

doesn't concern

me

at all that

young people are taking

time out from the educational and occupational assembly lines to experiment with consciousness, to dabble with new forms of ex8

Looking Back

perience and artistic expression. The present generation under the age of twenty-five is the wisest and holiest generation that the

human

race has ever seen. And, by God, instead of lamenting,

derogating, and imprisoning them, to them, and turn on with them.

we

should support them,

listen

Throughout human

history,

humans who have wanted


inside

to ex-

pand

their consciousness, to find deeper

selves,

have been able to do

time and energy to do so. walk barefooted 2,000 miles to find spiritual teachers who would turn them on to Buddha, Mohammed, or Ramakrishna.
If

themmeaning were to commit the they willing In other times and countries, men would
it if

on LSD

we're speaking in a general way, what happens to everyone is the experience of incredible acceleration and intensifiall
if

cation of

senses

and

all

mental processes
it.

which can be very


a thousand miUion

confusing

you're not prepared for

Around

signals fire off in

an LSD

your brain every second; during any second in session, you find yourself tuned in on thousands of these

messages that ordinarily you don't register consciously. And you may be getting an incredible number of simultaneous messages from different parts of your body. Since you're not used to this,
it

can lead to incredible ecstasy or

it

can lead to confusion. Some

people are freaked by this Niagara of sensory input. Instead of

one or two or three things happening in tidy sequence, you're suddenly flooded by hundreds of lights and colors and sensations and images, and you can get quite lost.
having
just
. . .

You

sense a strange powerful force beginning to unloose and

radiate through your body. In

normal perception, we are aware

of static

symbols. But as the

LSD

effect takes hold, everything

movement
It's

begins to move, and this relentless, impersonal, slowly swelling will continue through the several hours of the session.
as

though for
still

all

of your normal waking

life

you have been

caught in a

suddenly the

show comes

photograph, in an awkward, stereotyped posture; alive, balloons out to several dimensions

and becomes irradiated with color and energy.

TIMOTHY LEARY

LSD and
The
first

the Senses

you notice is an incredible enhancement of sensory awareness. Take the sense of sight. LSD vision is to normal vision as normal vision is to the picture on a badly tuned television set.
thing

Under LSD, it's as though you have microscopes up to your eyes, in which you see jewel-like, radiant details of anything your eye
falls

upon.

You

are really seeing for the

first

time

not

static,

symbolic perception of learned things, but patterns of light bouncing off the objects around you and hurtling at the speed of light
into the mosaic or rods

and cones
is

in the retina of
alive

your

eye. Every-

thing seems
light

alive.

Everything
retina.

beaming diamond-bright

waves into your

Ordinarily

we

phone, the sound of somebody's words. But

hear just isolated sounds: the rings of a telewhen you turn on

with LSD, the organ of Corti in your inner ear becomes a trembling membrane seething with tattoos of sound waves. The vibra-

seem to penetrate deep inside you, swell and burst there. You hear one note of a Bach sonata, and it hangs there, glittering,
tions

pulsating, for

around

it.

an endless length of time, while you slowly orbit Then, hundreds of years later, comes the second note

of the sonata, and again, for hundreds of years, you slowly drift

around the two notes, observing the harmony and the discords, and reflecting on the history of music.

When

your nervous system

is

turned on with LSD, and

all

the

wires are flashing, the senses begin to overlap and merge. You not only hear but see the music emerging from the speaker system,
like

dancing

particles, like

squirming curls of toothpaste.

You

ac-

tually see the


it.

sound

in multicolored patterns while you're hearing

At the same time, you are the sound, you are the note, you are the string of the violin or the piano. And every one of your organs
is

pulsating,

and having orgasms

in

rhythm with

it.

Taste

is

intensified, too,

like eating

during an

LSD

although normally you wouldn't session, any more than you feel

feel

like

10

Looking Back

eating
jet.

when you
if

take your

first

solo at the controls of a supersonic

Although
all

you

eat after a session, there


its

of

the particular qualities of food

an appreciation texture and resiliency


is

and

viscosity

such as

we

are not conscious of in a

normal

state

of awareness.

As
an

for smell, this

LSD

experience.
life,

breathing

one of the most overwhelming aspects of seems as though for the first time you are and you remember with amusement and distaste
is

It

that plastic, odorless, artificial gas that

you used to consider

air.

During the
haling

LSD

experience, you discover that you're actually in-

an atmosphere composed of millions of microscopic

strands of olfactory ticker tape, exploding in your nostrils with

meaning. When you sit across the room from a woman an LSD session, you're aware of thousands of penetrating during chemical messages floating from her through the air into your
ecstatic

sensory center, a

exude at

symphony of a thousand odors that all of us every moment, the shampoo she uses, her cologne, her
grenades of erot-

sweat, the exhaust and discharge from her digestive system, her

sexual perfume, the fragrance of her clothing


icism exploding in the olfactory
cell.

Touch Becomes
I

Electric as

Well as Erotic

during one session in which my wife Rosemary leaned over and lightly touched the palm of my hand with her finger. Immediately a hundred thousand end cells in my hand

remember

moment

exploded in soft orgasm. Ecstatic energies pulsated up my arms and rocketed into my brain, where another hundred thousand
cells softly

exploded
filled

in pure, delicate pleasure.

The

distance be-

tween

my

wife's finger

and the palm of

my

hand was about 50

miles of space,

of silver

with cotton candy, infiltrated with thousands wires hurtling energy back and forth. Wave after wave

of exquisite energy pulsed from her finger.

Wave upon wave

of

11

TIMOTHY LEARY
ethereal tissue rapture
delicate,

shuddering

coursed back and

forth

from her

finger to

my

palm.

Transcendentally erotic rapture. An enormous amount of information from every fiber of your body is released under LSD, most especially including sexual energy.

There

is

no question

that

LSD

is

the

most powerful aphro-

disiac ever discovered.

Sex under
I

don't

LSD becomes miraculously enhanced and intensified. mean that it simply generates genital energy. It doesn't

automatically produce a longer erection. Rather, it increases your sensitivity a thousand percent. Let me put it this way: Compared with sex under LSD, the way you've been making love no matter

how

ecstatic the pleasure

you think you

get

from

it

is

like

making and cellular

love to a department store

window dummy. In sensory communion on LSD, you may spend a half-hour

making love with eyeballs, another half-hour making love with breath. As you spin through a thousand sensory and cellular organic changes, she does too. Ordinarily, sexual communication involves one's
cals,

own

chemi-

pressure and interactions of a very

localized nature, in

what
I

the psychologists call the erogenous zones.


think.

vulgar concept,

cell in

it's as though every is have trillions and making love with you your body her skin but sinks caress every cell in her body. Her hand doesn't down into and merges with ancient dynamos of ecstasy within

When

you're making love under LSD,

her.

Every time

I've

taken LSD,
is all

have made love. In

fact, that is

what

the

LSD

experience

union, communion.
dlelight,
fruit

It's all

about. Merging, yielding, flowing, lovemaking. You make love with can-

with sound waves from a record player, with a bowl of on the table, with the trees. You're in pulsating harmony
the energy around you.
three inevitable goals of

with

all

The

LSD

sessions are to discover

and

make

love with

God, to discover and make love with


12

yourself,

Looking Back

and to discover and make love with another. You can't make
with yourself unless you've made
it

it

with the timeless energy process around you, and you can't make it with a mate until you've made it with yourself. One of the great purposes of an LSD session
is

The more expanded your consciousness, the further out you can move beyond your mind, the deeper, the richer, the longer and more meaningful your sexual communion. Only the most reckless poet would attempt to describe an orgasm on LSD. What does one say to a little child? The child asks, "Daddy, what is sex like?" and you try to describe it, and then
sexual union.
the
little

child says, "Well,

is it

fun

like the circus?"

And you say, And the child And you say,


that."

"Well, not exactly like that."


says, "Is
it

fun like chocolate


like that

ice

cream?"

"Well,

it's

but much,

much more than

And the child says, "Is it fun like the rollercoaster, then?" And you say, "Well that's part of it, but it's even more than
that."

In short,

can't

tell

you what

it's

like,

because

it's

not like

anything that's ever happened to you

and there

aren't

words
like

adequate to describe
until

it

anyway. You won't know what


I

it's

you

try

it

yourself and then

won't need to

tell

you.

This preoccupation with the number of orgasms is a hang-up for many men and women. It's as crude and vulgar a concept as

wondering
Still,
it's

how much

she paid for the negligee.

a fact that

women who

ordinarily have difficulty

achieving orgasm

find themselves capable of multiple

orgasms un-

der LSD, even several hundred orgasms.


I can only speak for myself and about my own experience. I can only compare what I was with what I am now. In the last six

responsiveness to, my participation in every form of sensory expression, has multiplied a thousandfold.
years,

my

openness

to,

my

13

TIMOTHY LEARY

The sexual impact is, of course, the open but private secret about LSD, which none of us has talked about in the last few years. It's socially dangerous enough to say that LSD helps you find divinity and helps you discover yourself. You're already in trouble when you say that. But then if you announce that the psychedelic experience
is

basically a sexual experience, you're asking to bring

the whole middle-aged, middle-class monolith down on your

head.

At the present time, however, I'm under a thirty-year sentence of imprisonment, which for a forty-five-year-old man is essentially
a
life

term, and in addition,

am

under indictment on a second


is

marijuana offense involving a sixteen-year sentence. Since there

hardly anything more that middle-aged, middle-class authority can do to me and since the secret is out anyway among the

young

feel

I'm free at this

moment
is

to say

what we've never

said before: that sexual ecstasy

the basic reason for the current

LSD boom.
Young people
are taking

LSD and

discovering

God and meanreally think that

ing; they're discovering themselves; but did

you

sex wasn't the fundamental reason for this surging, youthful social

bloom? You can no more do research on LSD and leave out

sexual ecstasy than you can do microscopic research on tissue and


leave out cells.

LSD
The

is

first

not an automatic trigger to sexual awakening, however. ten times you take it, you might not be able to have a

all, because you're so overwhelmed and deor lighted, frightened and confused, by the novelty; the idea of having sex might be irrelevant or incomprehensible at the moment. But it depends upon the setting and the partner. It is almost

sexual experience at

inevitable,

if

man and

sexual energies will

mate take LSD together, that their be unimaginably intensified, and unless clumhis

14

Looking Back

siness or fright

on the part of one or the other blocks

it,

will lead

to a deeper experience than they ever thought possible. From the beginning of our research, we have been aware of this

tremendous personal power


take
it

in

LSD. You must be very careful to

only with someone you

know

really well, because

it's al-

most

inevitable that a

man

will fall in love

with the

woman who

shares his
prints,

LSD

experience.

Deep and

lasting neurological im-

LSD

profound emotional bonds can develop as a result of an session, bonds that can last a lifetime. For this reason, we

have always been extremely cautious about running sessions with men and women. We always try to have a subject's husband or
wife present during his or her
first

session, so that as these

pow-

erful urges develop, they are directed in

ways

that can be lived

out responsibly after the session.

One
all

of the great lessons I've learned from


all

LSD

is

that every

man

contains the essence of

men and

every

woman

has within her

women.

remember
I

a session a few years ago in which, with

horror and ecstasy,


eyes

opened

my

eyes

and looked

into Rosemary's

and was pulled

into the deep pools of her being floating softly

in the center of her

mind, experiencing everything that she was

experiencing,

were riveted

knowing every thought she ever had. As my eyes to hers, her face began to melt and change. I saw
girl,

her as a young

as a baby, as
face.
I

an old

woman

with gray hair

and seamy, wrinkled

saw her

as a witch, a

Madonna,

nagging crone, a radiant queen, a Byzantine virgin, a tired worldly-wise oriental whore who had seen every sight of life repeated a thousand times. She was all women, all woman, the essence of female, eyes smiling quizzically, resignedly, devilishly,

always inviting, "See me, hear me, join me, merge with me, keep the dance going." Now the implications of this experience for sex

and mating,

think are obvious.

It's

because of

this,

not because

15

TIMOTHY LEARY
of moral restrictions or restraints, that I've been

monogamous

in

my

use of

LSD

over the

last six years.

The notion of running around

trying to find different mates

is

a very low-level concept. We are living in a world of expanding population in which there are more and more beautiful young
girls

and boys coming off the assembly

line

each month.

It's

ob-

vious that the sexual criteria of the past are going to be changed and that what's demanded of creatures with our sensory and cellular repertoire
is

not just one affair after another with one young

body and varieties of your own identity with another. This involves time and commitment to the voyage. There is a certain kind of
neurological and cellular fidelity that develops. I have said for many years now that in the future the grounds for divorce would

after another, but the exploration of the incredible depths

not be that your mate went to bed with another and bounced around on a mattress for an hour or two, but that your mate had

an

LSD

session with

somebody

else,

because the bonds and the

connections that develop are so powerful. For the most part, during the last six years,
quietly in our research centers. But

have lived very

on

lecture tours

and

in highly

is no question that a charismatic public figure does generate attraction and stimulate a sexual

enthusiastic social gatherings, there

response.

Every

woman

has built into her

cells

and

tissues the longing for

open up and share her own divinity. But casual sexual encounters do not satisfy this deep longing. Any
a hero, sage-mythic male, to

charismatic person

who

is

conscious of his or her

own

mythic

potency awakens this basic hunger and pays reverence to it at the level that is harmonious and appropriate at the time. Compulsive body grabbing, however, is rarely the vehicle of such communication.

I'm no one to

tell

anyone

else

what

to do. But

would

say,

if

you use

LSD

to

make out

sexually in the seductive sense, then

you'll be a very humifiated

and embarrassed person, because


16

it's

Looking Back

LSD, her eyes would be microscopic, what you were up to, coming on with some heavy-handed, mustache-twisting routine. You'd look like a consummate ass, and she'd laugh at you, or you'd look like a monster and she'd scream and go into a paranoid state. Nothing
just

not going to work.

On

and she'd

see very plainly

good can happen with LSD


for manipulative purposes.

if it's

used crudely or for power or

You must remember

that in taking

LSD

with someone

else,

you

are voluntarily relinquishing your personality defenses and opening yourself up in a very vulnerable manner. If you and the other are ready to

do

this,

there

port be able to

if

you took a

trip

would be an immediate and deep raptogether. People from the LSD cult would
a brief meeting, but an inexperienced
it

make

love

upon

person would probably find


ple

might become

quite isolated

extremely confusing, and the peofrom each other. They might be

whirled into the rapture or confusion of their own inner workings and forget entirely that the other person is there.

LSD is no guarantee of any specific social or sexual outcome. One man may take LSD and leave wife and family and go off to be a monk on the banks of the Ganges. Another may take LSD and go back to her husband. It's a highly individual situation. Highly unpredictable. During LSD sessions,
is

LSD

not a sexual cure-all.

you

see, there

can come a microscopic perception of your routine

social and professional life. You may discover to your horror that you're living a robot existence, that your relationships with your

and your family are stereotyped, empty, and devoid of meaning. At this point, there might come a desire to renounce this hollow existence, to collect your thoughts, to go away and cloister yourself from the world like a monk while you
boss, your husband,
figure out

what kind of

life

you want to go back

to, if any.

Conversely, we've found that in giving

LSD

to

nastic sects, there has been a definite tendency for

members of mothem to leave

17

TIMOTHY LEARY
the monastic
life

and to

find a

men in their late forties who but who even at this mature age returned to society, married and made the heterosexual adjustment. It's not coincidental that of all more than 200 minthose I've given LSD to, the religious group
isters, priests, divinity

mating relationship. Several were had been monks for 15 or 20 years,

students,

and nuns
in

has experienced the


religious groups that

most intense sexual


prize chastity

reaction.

And

two

and

celibacy, there have been wholesale defections


left their religious

of

monks and nuns who

orders to get married


session,

after a series of

LSD

experiences.

The LSD

you

see, is

an

overwhelming awakening of experience; it releases potent, primal energies, and one of these is the sexual impulse, which is the strongest impulse at any level of organic life. For the first time in
their lives, perhaps, these people
erful life forces that they

had walled

were meeting head on the powoff with ritualized defenses

and

self-delusions.

For almost everyone, the

LSD

experience

is

a confrontation with

new forms

wisdom and energy that dwarf and humiliate the This mind. experience of awe and revelation is often described as religious. I consider my work basically religious, because it has,
of
as
its

goal, the systematic expansion of consciousness


call divine.

and the
the

discovery of energies within, which men

From

psychedelic point of view, almost all religions are attempts, sometimes limited temporarily or nationally, to discover inner potential.

Well,

LSD

is

Western yoga. The aim of

all

Eastern religion,

aim of LSD, is basically to get high that is, to expand and find ecstasy and revelation within. consciousness your
like the

18

Looking Back

Levels of Consciousness
by the experience of hundreds of thousands of trained voyagers who've taken LSD
defines seven different levels of awareness.

Our system

of consciousness

attested to

The lowest levels of consciousness are sleep and emotional stupor, which are produced by narcotics, barbiturates and our national stupefacient, alcohol.

third level of consciousness

is

the

conventional wakeful

state, in

which awareness

is

hooked

to con-

ditioned symbols: flags, dollar signs, job titles, brand names, party affiliations, and the like. This is the level that most people, in-

cluding psychiatrists, regard as reality; they don't of it.

know

the half

levels of awareness, somatic and sensory, would, be of think, particular interest to Playboy readers because most of them are of the younger generation, which is much more sen-

The next two

sual than the puritanical Americans of the older generation. In

order to reach the somatic and sensory levels, you have to have something that will turn off symbols and open up your billions
of sensory cameras to the billions of impulses that are hitting

them. The chemical that opens the door to

this level

has been well

known

for centuries to cultures that stress delicate, sensitive reg-

istration of sensory stimulation: the


tures, the

Arab

cultures, the Indian culis

Mogul
is

cultures.

It is

marijuana. There

no question
not only

that marijuana

a sensual stimulator,

and

this explains
it

why

it's

favored by young people but

why

arouses fear and

panic among the middle-aged, middle-class, whiskey-drinking, blue-nosed bureaucrats who run the narcotics agencies. If they only knew what they missing. But we must bid a sad farewell to
the bodily levels of consciousness

and go on to the

sixth level,

which

call the cellular level. It's well

psychedelics such as mescaline senses into a world of cellular awareness.


fact of the matter
is

known that the stronger and LSD take you beyond the

Now
100

the neurological

that every one of your

billion brain cells

19

TIMOTHY LEARY
is

know comes from


ings of your cells.

hooked up to some 25,000 other cells, and everything you a communication exchange at the nerve end-

During an LSD session, enormous clusters of pathways are turned on, and consciousness whirls into eerie panoramas for which we have no words or concepts. Here the
these

metaphor that's most accurate is the metaphor of the microscope, which brings into awareness cellular patterns that are invisible to
the

naked

eye. In the

same way, LSD brings

into awareness the

cellular conversations that are inaudible to the

normal conscious-

ness and for

which we have no adequate symbolic language. You become aware of processes you were never tuned into before. You
yourself sinking

feel

body, slowly drifting

down into the soft tissue swamp of your own down dark, red waterways and floating

through capillary canals, softly propelled through endless cellular


factories, ancient fibrous clockworlds: ticking, clicking, chugging,

pumping
industries

relentlessly.

Being swallowed up this way by the tissue and the bloody, sinev^ carryings-on inside your body
first
. . .

can be an appalling experience the But it can also be an awesome one


ence and wonder.

time

it

happens to you.
full

fearful, but

of rever-

The next

level

is

precellular level,

which

even more strange and terrifying. This is the is experienced only under a heavy dose of
are
all

LSD. Your nerve


aware
that
is

cells

aware

as Professor Einstein
is

was

all

matter,

structure,

pulsating information;

well, there

a shattering

when your body, and

deep psychedelic session the world around you, dissolves into shim-

moment

in the

mering latticeworks of pulsating white waves, into silent, subcellular worlds of shutthng information. But this phenomenon is
It's been reported by mystics and visionaries throughout the last 4,000 years of recorded history as "the white light" of the "dance of energy." Suddenly you realize that every-

nothing new.

thing you thought of as reality or even as Hfe

itself

including

your body

is

just a

dance of

particles.

You

find yourself horribly

alone in a dead, impersonal world of

raw data flooding your

sense

20

Looking Back

organs. This, of course,

is

one of the oldest Oriental philosophic

notions, that nothing exists except in the chemistry of your

own

consciousness. But

when
it

it first

really

happens to you through the

can come as a terrorizing, isolating discovthis point, the unprepared LSD subject often screams out: ery. "I'm dead!" And he sits there transfigured with fear, afraid to
experience of LSD,

At

move. For the experienced voyager, however, this revelation can be exalting: You've climbed inside Einstein's formula, penetrated
to the ultimate nature of matter,

and you're pulsing


I've

in

harmony

with
It's

its

primal, cosmic beat. happened to me about half of the 311 times


it

taken LSD.

And

every time

begins to happen,
is

no matter how much expebecause nobody

rience you've had, there


likes to see the

that

moment of terror,

comfortable world of objects and symbols and


ultimate physical design.

even

cells disintegrate into the

We know that there are many other levels of energy within and
around
us,

and

hope that within our

lifetimes

we

will
is

have these

opened up

to us, because the fact

is

that there

no form of

information on this planet that isn't recorded somewhere in your body. Built within every cell are molecular strands of memory and

awareness called the

DNA

code, the genetic blueprint that has

designed and executed the construction of your body. This is an ancient strand of molecules that possesses memories of every previous organism that has contributed to your present existence. In code you have the genetic history of your father and your

DNA
It

mother.

goes back, back, back through the generations, through

the eons. Your body carries a protein record of everything that's happened to you since the moment you were conceived as a onecell

organism. It's a living history of every form of energy transformation on this planet back to the beginning of the life process
over two billion years ago. When LSD subjects report retrogression and reincarnation visions, this is not mysterious or supernatural.
It's

simply modern biogenetics.

We

don't

know how

these

memories are
21

stored, but countless

TIMOTHY LEARY
events from early and even intrauterine
life

are registered in your

brain and can be flashed into consciousness during an


perience.

LSD

ex-

The experiences
recorded before.
It's

that

come from LSD


and touch

are actually relived

in

sight, sound, smell, taste

exactly the

way they were

possible to check out

some of

these ancient memories, but

banks, which are built into your protein cellular strands, can never be checked on by external observation. Who can possibly corroborate what your nervous sysfor the
part, these

most

memory

tem picked up before your


obvious fact
is

birth, inside

your mother? But the

that your nervous system

were

still

in the uterus. It

was
is it

consciousness.
if

Why,

then,

was operating while you receiving and recording units of surprising that at some later date,

the nine perilous


I've

you have the chemical key, you can release these memories of and exciting months before you were born.^
charted

my own
plumb

family tree and traced


the gene pools

it

back as

far as

can. I've tried to

from which

my

ancestors

emerged in Ireland and France. There are certain moments in


can reach
racial
all

my

evolutionary history that

the time, but there are certain untidy corners in

my

path that I often get boxed into, and because they are frightening, I freak out and open my eyes and stop it. In many of these

back about 300 years, I often run across a particular French-appearing man with a black mustache, a rather
sessions,

dangerous-looking guy.

And

there are several highly eccentric

recurrent sequences in an Anglo-Saxon country that have embarrassed me when I relived them in LSD sessions goings-on that

shocked

my

Moments
Irish

twentieth-century person. of propagation, scenes of rough ancestral sexuality in

barrooms, in haystacks, in canopied beds, in covered wagons, on beaches, on the moist jungle floor, and moments of crisis
in

which

my

forebears escape from fang, from spear, from contidal

spiracy,

from

wave and avalanche.


22

I've

concluded that the

Looking Back

to

imprints most deeply engraved in neurological memory bank have do with these moments of life-affirming exultation and exhil-

aration in the perpetuation and survival of the self and of the


species.

be nothing more than luridly melodramatic, Saturday serials conjured up by my forebrain. But w^hatever they are memory or imagination it's the most exciting adventure

They may

all

I've ever

been involved

in.

Turn On, Tune

In,

Drop Out

"Turn on" means to contact and explore the ancient energies and w^isdoms that are built into your nervous system. They provide unspeakable excitements and revelations. "Tune in" means to
harness and communicate these

new perspectives

in a

harmonious

dance with the external world. "Drop out" means to detach yourself from the tribal game. Current models of social adjustment
mechanized, computerized, socialized, intellectualized, televised,
Sanforized
clearly that

make no
American

sense to the
is

new LSD

generation,

who

see

society becoming an air-conditioned anthill. In every generation of human history, thoughtful men have turned on and dropped out of the tribal game and thus stimulated

the larger society to lurch ahead. Every historical advance has


resulted

from the

stern pressure of visionary

men who have


III,

de-

clared their independence from the game: "Sorry, George

we

don't buy your model. We're going to try something new."; "Sorry, Louis XVI, we've got a new idea. Deal us out"; "Sorry, LBJ, it's time to mosey on beyond the Great Society."

The

reflex reaction of the


If

panic and irritation.

gene pool to the creative drop-out is anyone questions the social order, he
that he will
citizen.

threatens the whole shaky edifice.


to the creative drop-out
is

hardworking, conforming

The automatic, angry reaction become a parasite on the This is not true. The LSD ex-

23

TIMOTHY LEARY
it spurs a perience does not lead to passivity and withdrawal; in better ways, to driving hunger to communicate in new forms,

express a more harmonious message, to live a better life. The LSD cult has already wrought revolutionary changes in American culture. If

you were to conduct a

poll of creative

young musicians

in this country,

you'd find at least

80 percent are using psychedelic

drugs in a systematic way. And this new psychedelic style has produced not only a new rhythm in modern music, but a new

decor for our discotheques, a


kinetic visual art, a

new form

of film-making, a
revise

new
our

new

literature,

and has begun to

philosophic and psychological thinking. Remember, it's the colthe smartest and most promising lege kids who are turning on What an of the youngsters. exciting prospect: a generation of creative youngsters refusing to
fices, refusing to sign

march

in step, refusing to

go to

of-

up on the installment
will

plan, refusing to climb

aboard the treadmill.


Don't worry. Each one

work out

his individual solution.


inject their

Some Some
ties

will return to the establishment will live

and

new

ideas.

underground as

free agents, self-employed artists,

artisans,

and

writers.

Some

are already forming small

out of country.

Many

are starting schools for children

communiand

adults

who wish to

learn the use of their sense organs. Psychedelic

industries

businesses are springing up: bookstores, art galleries. Psychedelic may involve more manpower in the future than the

automobile industry has produced in the

last

20

years. In

our

technological society of the future, the problem will be not to get people to work but to develop graceful, fulfilling ways of living a

more

serene, beautiful

and

creative

life.

Psychedelics will help to

point the way.

No

one has the right to

tell

anyone

else

what he should or should

not do with this great and last frontier of freedom. I think that anyone who wants to have a psychedelic experience and is willing

24

Looking Back

to prepare for

it

and

to

examine

his

own

hang-ups and neurotic


it.

tendencies should be allowed to have a crack at

LSD
is

teaches us the understanding that basic to the

life

impulse

the question, should

issue,

sense:

we go on with life? This is the only real when you come down to it, in the evolutionary cosmic whether to make it with a member of the opposite sex and
going, or not to. At the deepest level of consciousness, this

keep

it

question comes up over and over again. I've struggling with it in scores of LSD sessions. How did we get here and into this mess?

How

do we get out? There are two ways out of the basic philosophic isolation of man: You can ball your way out, by having

children, which is immortality of a sort. Or you can step off the wheel. Buddhism, the most powerful psychology that man has

ever developed, says essentially that.

My

choice, however,

is

to

keep the

game going. I'm Hindu not Buddhist. this affirmation of my own life, I've learned to confine Beyond
life

my
the

attention to the philosophic questions that hit

on the

really

shrieking, crucial issues:

Who wrote the cosmic script? What does


Is

DNA code

expect of me?

the big genetic-code

show

live

or

on tape? Who is the sponsor? Are we completely trapped inside our nervous systems, or can we make real contact with anyone else out there? I intend to spend the rest of my life, with psycheand endelic help, searching for the answers to these questions
couraging others to do the same.

LSD

is

only the

first

of

many new chemicals

that will exhilarate

learning, expand consciousness and enhance memory in years to come. These chemicals will inevitably revolutionize our proce-

dures of education, child rearing, and social behavior. Within one generation these chemical keys to the nervous system will be used
as regular tools of learning.

You

will be asking

your children,

when

come home from school, not "What book are you "Which molecules are you using to open up new but reading?"
they
Libraries of Congress inside your nervous system?" There's

no
in

doubt that chemicals

will be the central

method of education

25

TIMOTHY LEARY
The reason for this, of course, is that the nervous system, and learning and memory itself, is a chemical process. A society in which a large percentage of the population changes consciousness regularly and harmoniously with psychedelic drugs
the future.
will bring

about a very different way of

life.

As some
trips, rather
It's

science fiction writers predict, people will be taking

than drinks, at psychedelic cocktail parties.

tions at

happening already. In this country, there are already funcwhich LSD may be served. I was at a large dance recently

where two-thirds of the guests were on LSD. And during a scholarly LSD conference in San Francisco a few months ago, I went
along with 400 people on a picnic at which almost everyone turned on with LSD. It was very serene. They were like a herd of
deer in the forest.
In years to
will be possible to

come,

it

chedelic session; in a limited

way, that can be

have a lunch-hour psydone now with

DMT,
It

fast action, lasting perhaps a half-hour. will also be large reservations of maybe 30 there be that may or 40 square miles, where people will go to have LSD sessions in

which has a very

tranquil privacy.

Everyone

will

not be turned on

all

the time. There will always

be some functions that require a narrow from of consciousness. You don't want your airplane pilot flying higher than the plane

and having Buddhist revelations in the cockpit. Just as you don't play golf on Times Square, you won't want to take LSD where
linear,

symbol-manipulating attention

is

required. In a sophisti-

cated way, you'll attune the desired level of consciousness to the particular surrounding that will feed and nourish you. No one will commit his life to any single level of consciousness.
Sensible use of the nervous system

would suggest

that a quarter

of out time will be spent in symbolic activities, producing and communicating in conventional, tribal ways. But the fully conscious
life

schedule will allow considerable time

perhaps an

hour or two a day

devoted to the yoga of the senses, to the

26

Looking Back

enhancement of sensual

ecstasies through marijuana and hashish, and one day a week to completely moving outside the sensory and symbolic dimensions into the transcendental realms that are

open to you through LSD. This is not science fiction fantasy. I have lived most of the last six years until the recent unpleasantness doing exactly that: taking LSD once a week and smoking marijuana once a day.

is

The Psychedelic Life will enable each person to realize that he not a game-playing robot put on this planet to be given a Social Security Number and to be spun on the assembly line of school,
Through LSD, each

college, career, insurance, funeral, good-bye.

being will be taught to understand that the entire history of evolution is recorded inside his brain. The challenge of the complete human life will be for each person to recapitulate and
experientially explore every aspect

human

and

vicissitude of this ancient

and majestic wilderness. Each person


dha, his

will

become

his

own Budon

own

Einstein, his

own

Galileo. Instead of relying

canned, static, dead knowledge passed on from other symbol producers, he will be using his span of 80 or so years on this planet
to live out every possibility of the

subhuman adventure. As more


these explorations, he will

human, prehuman, and even respect and time are diverted to be less hung up on trivial, external

pastimes.
leisure.

And this may be the natural solution to the problem of When all of the heavy work and mental drudgery is taken

over by machines, what are we going to do with ourselves: build even bigger machines? The obvious and only answer to this pe-

going to have to explore the infinity of inner space, to discover the terror and adventure and ecstasy that lie within us all.
culiar

dilemma

is

that

man

is

27

My

First Sexual

Encounter

An

endless

number of memoirs,

hiographieSy

and au-

tobiographies have been written over the centuries. Authors have described their births in log cabins, in
ship-holds, in royal bedrooms, in
etc.

cow

bars, mangers,

None of these, to my knowledge, have begun the story at the moment when the adventure actually
gins. I refer,

life

be-

of encounter of one's
that magic

course, to that
life:

most important sexual up


to

the circumstances leading

all

over

moment when Dad's Mom's awaiting egg.

eager sperm exploded

CONCEIVED ON A MILITARY RESERVATION, WeST POINT, iWAS New York, on the night of January 17, 1920. On the preceding day alcohol had become an illegal drug. Academy records reveal that there was a dance that Saturday night at the Officer's Club. Now that booze was illegal, the ingestion of ethyl alcohol took on glamorous, naughty implications. The Roaring Twenties were about to begin.

28

Looking Back

My mother,

Abigail, often recalled that, during her pregnancy,

moonshine and bathtub gin hung like a rowdy smog over Officer's Row. My father, Timothy, known as Tote, was about to convert from social drinking to alcohol adthe smell of distilling
diction. In training

me

for future

life

he often told
at
all.

me

that Pro-

hibition
It

was bad but not

as

bad

as

no booze

was

a very special night! Dress-blue uniforms, white gloves,

long gowns, Antoine de Paris mannish shingle bobs. The flirtatious but virtuous Abigail, by all accounts, was the most beautiful

woman on
Gibson Girl

the post: jet-black hair, milky-soft white skin, curvy


figure.

Tote was behaving arrogantly, as usual. Always the sportsman, he stood at the bar: tall, slim, pouring an illegal recreational drug from
a silver pocket flask into the glasses of Captain
tain Geoffrey Prentice,

Omar

Bradley, Cap-

and Lieutenant General George Patton.


at a linen-covered, candlelit table, talked to

Abigail,

abandoned

her friend General Douglas MacArthur, Superintendent of the Mil-

Academy, who asked her to dance. The orchestra played " a Japanese Sandman. Lt. Patton, a notorious womanizer, cut
itary

"Just
in.

Afterward, Tote approached Abigail's table. Swaying a bit to the " "Missouri Waltz, my father said, "Look at you sitting there as proper

Mary. I'm going to take you for a little annunciation." her Abigail, elegant poise compromised only by the faintest her folded fan, rose gracefully, waved gaily to her companflush,
as the Virgin

ions

and walked to the cloak room.

Captain Timothy Leary drove his Packard unsteadily to the house on Officer's Row, humming "Somebody Stole My Gal."

My

mother

retired to the

knelt beside the bed,

bedroom, changed to her nightgown, and prayed.

Abigail and Tote:

beat

him and

left

Timothy Leary's him at the age of

father

twelve. His

was an army dentist, a drunk who mother was a devout Catholic.

29

TIMOTHY LEARY
Hail Mother, Full of

Grace

Tote mixed a drink of distilled


unsteadily to the
the

gin.

bedroom, removed

Draining his glass, he ascended his Army Blue Jacket with


silk socks, his

two

silver bars, his

black shoes, his black

white

next to Abigail and initiated the prim fertilization ritual typical of his generation. Roughly two weeks previous, a splendid, one-in-a-lifetime adlay

BVDs. He

down

million ova stored in

venturous egg had been selected carefully from the supply of one my mother's body and had slowly, sweetly,

oozed down her

soft, silky

Fallopian

Highway

until

it

reached,

on

the night of January 17, 1920, the predetermined rendezvous.

The Lord

Is

with Thee

At the moment of climax. Tote deposited over 400 million matozoa into my mother's "reproductive tract."
Opinions
spired.
still

sper-

vary in

scientific circles

about what then tran-

lion

According to traditional biological scenarios, the 400 milsperm one of which was carrying half of me immediately
in

engaged
to

some Olympic swimming

race, jostling,

bumping, and

frantically twisting in Australian crawl or flagellating tail stroke

to rape poor, docile-receptive Miss Egg. occurred when the successful jock-sperm Reproduction allegedly
forcibly penetrated the
I

win the competition,

ovum.
theory of conception.
I

passionately reject this


I

was not reproNat-

ducedl

was created by an

intelligent, teleological process of

ural Election. Disreputable, goofy


at the level of

RNA.

Like you,

Lamarck turns out to be right was precisely, intelligently re-

created to play a role necessary for the evolution of our gene pool.

The
final
It

selection of the fertilizing

sperm and the decision about the

chromosome division was made by the Egg. was She of me that had the final say.
30

Looking Back

Blessed Art
I

Thou Among

Women

found myself rocketed into Abigail's re-creational laboratory, exactly where I was supposed to be, in a warm, pink, ocean-cave pulsing with perfumed signals and chemical instructions, enjoying
the ineffable Bliss oft-described by the mystics. Up ahead, I saw to my astonishment that Miss Egg, far from being a passive, dumb blob with round heels waiting to be

knocked up by some first-to-arrive, breathless, sweaty, muscular sperm, was a luminescent sun, radiating amused intelligence, surrounded by magnetic fields scanners and laser-defenses.
bristling

with phosphorescent radar

With
ied her

this particular Elegant,

did not rush in with

macho

zeal.

Educated, Experienced Egg, one Laid back, late blooming, I stud-

sensory apertures, trying to decipher the signals she caemitted, trying to figure out What Does WoMan Want?

many

My

Naturally performed some tricks to attract her attention. They must have worked because soft magnetic attraction floated me gently along the Grand Ovarian Canal, up the
reer
it.

depended on

Boulevard of Broken Genes, feeling myself measured, treasured,

and

in

some

giggling way, sought

and taught.

And
I

Blessed

is

the Fruit of Thy


creamy home,

Womb
slim, serpent

was eased

into this soft,

my

body

sputtering with pleasure.


sphere, the

The

closer

was pulled

to this solarintelligence.

more

dissolved in whirlpools of

warm

Goodbye. Hello!

31

Discovering the Source of All Pleasure

LAST THREE DECADES OF

MY LIFE, BOTH PROFESSIONAL AND


PSYCHE-

THE amateur,
DELIC and

have been dedicated to the study of the


the

CYBERNETIC. PSYCHEDELIC SCIENCE studies

the relationship between the


is

conscious mind and that universe of digital information that based on the brain.

CYBERNETIC SCIENCE

studies the relationship

between the

conscious mind and that universe of digital information which quantum physicists say make up the texture of all realities.

How can we
is

decode

this

OFF/ON language

of the universe that

captured, produced, and stored in digital programs and appUances and manifested on screens?

1960 when a group of psychologists, philosophers, theologians, and scholars based in Cambridge, Massachusetts organized the Harvard Psychedelic Re-

My

untiring studies in this field began in

search Project.
1.

Our goals were: PSYCHEDELIC: to develop methods

for activating,

making

conscious, contacting, exploring regions of the brain that are nor-

mally inaccessible to awareness.


2.

CYBERNETIC:
this

to objectify, precisely describe,

map, and
is

communicate
It is

unexplored information.

generally agreed that

what goes on

inside our heads

very

different

from what we actually do and

say.

32

Looking Back

To
all

complicate matters enormously, we are unaware of almost of the signal traffic that continually hums in our brains. The
processes around 100 million signals a

human nervous system


second.

From 1960 to 1963, more than a thousand sessions using psychedelic neurotransmitters produced voluminous data in the form
of reports, tests, and questionnaires. We concluded, as did every other research in this field, that "words" based on the 26 letters
of the alphabet could not describe these experiences.

Beginning in 1960,
scribe this data

we began devising a new language to dewhich flooded our minds during psychedelic ex-

periences.

used words, of course, in dozens of books, hundreds of articles, thousands of breathless lectures and inter-

We

views. But

we always

"Words

just

kept humming that ancient Ganges cannot express ..."

refrain:

quickly sensed that graphics, icons, yantras, and diagrams were more effective linguistic tools. So we scoured the libraries
for Oriental prints,

We

Hindu

paintings, Buddhist hieroglyphics.

These icons were better than words, serving, as they did, as curt, stripped-down formulae for the torrents of data we were
experiencing.
ages.

The

real

problem was they were

static,

frozen im-

quickly turned to electrical optics: visual images presented, not as smears of color on wood-pulp, but in mobile filmstrips and slides. We were particularly impressed with films of
biological events, microscopic scenes of cells pulsating
illary

So

we

and capconversations. Our laboratories developed methods for creour

travelogues by passing light This new "psychedelic art" form quickly became popular as "light shows" for rock concerts and special effects for films like "2001: A Space Odyssey."
ating
inter-biological

own

through colored

jells

and

fluids.

But right from the

start,

we

realized that the

most powerful and

33

TIMOTHY LEARY
natural language to describe (or at least
the open-brain experience

accompany and

facilitate)

was music.

By 1964, a long list of top musicians had come to Harvard and Millbrook for psychedelic experiences. The contract was simple:

We

brains.

would launch them on voyages of exploration into their Upon return they would report back to their experiences
the jazz musicians

in sound.

Among

who came

to our centers were:

Charles Mingus, Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Charles Lloyd, the Miles Davis Quartet, Alan Eager, members of the Duke
Ellington Band,

and much

so-forth.

Of rock musicians

there

was
Lalo

a full brigade including the Grateful Dead, half of the Beatles, the

Moody

Blues, etc. etc.

Of more

serious composers

we

recall

Schifren,

Harry Nilsson, Ravi Shankar,

Ali Akbar,

Ram

Siddha,

Geoff Prentice, and more.


Presiding over this musical scene

Maestro, King of the

was the Residential Musical High Trumpet and the new-Big-Band Sound,
Flora Lu,

Maynard Ferguson. The resident Zen-Mother was


spirituality are

whose

feats of elegant

recounted here.

Newton Center, Massachusetts


Spring 1962
Along the Charles River toward Boston a
in the cloudless sky.
I

sickle

moon hung low

arrived at

Logan Airport

just in time to see

the

New York

shuttle taxi in.


I

In

two minutes

caught sight of

my

visitors: Salinas, in jeans,

and with her Flora Lu, a smartly-dressed blond woman of about thirty with creamy skin, a full mouth, and enormous dark blue
eyes.

She wore no makeup, and her small face exuded worldliness

and

poise.

Flora

Lu looked me

over, her eyes flashing with intelligence.

34

Looking Back

"Well," she said, "you look like an earthling. After what Salinas told me, I was expecting an extraterrestrial of some sort."

At the curb was a middle-aged man with a serious case of


slumping shoulders. "Poor guy," murmured Flora Lu. "He doesn't look happy." On second glance I recognized that he was a friend of mine.

"Abe!"

Abe Maslow smiled "Can we give you a

back.
Uft?"
I

asked.

"No, don't bother," he said. "I'm waiting for a cab."

"Come
problem

along,"

insisted.

"We're going to Newton Center.


in the

No

you With Flora Lu and Salinas

to drop

off."

back

seat,

Abe

in front,

drove

through the tunnel, around the dock area of Boston, and along
the Charles River.

Abe and

kept up a running tour-guide com-

mentary on historical spots for the visitors. "What do you do, Abe?" asked Flora Lu.

"Abe
I

said.

one of the most important psychologists of our times," "Almost single-handedly he overthrew the Freudian notion
is

that the

human

unconscious

is

a primitive homicidal

swamp. Abe

introduced the term peak experience, and he's convinced a lot of people that the human psyche is filled with wonderful potentials
waiting to be awakened and used." "What's a peak experience?" Flora
the professor

Lu

asked.

"That's what we're going to have tonight," drawled Salinas, "if is good to us. Want to come to our session. Dr.

Maslow?"

Abe Maslow:

U.S. philosopher, psychologist,

and author of Toward a Psy-

chology of Being and Motivation and Personality. Maslow is known for inventing the hierarchy of needs in modern psychology, which range from basic physiological needs such as food and shelter, to esteem and selfactualization.

35

TIMOTHY LEARY
"I'd love to," replied

Abe, "but

rm

afraid

rm

not feeling too

cheerful."

"Wouldn't that exactly be the time to have a peak experience?"


asked Flora Lu.
"I

wouldn't know," Abe said


It's

softly,

"because

I've

never had

one.
it

the old philosopher's paradox.

Those who theorize about

are often the last to

do

it.

Freud taught us that."

Our group

that evening included a psychiatrist

and

his wife,

two

graduate students, and the two elegant ladies from Manhattan. Salinas dominated the session with her fast, needle-sharp hipster

mind.
In the morning I was up early. I made scrambled eggs and bacon for myself, and my children, Susan and Jack. Salinas and Flora Lu were still asleep. I drove Susan to the home of a friend,

where she was planning to spend the day, and took Jack to a nearby baseball park, where I acted as assistant manager of a Little League baseball team. Jack was the only one who played
every inning of the game, because he was a catcher and there was no other boy with his consistency at this difficult position. Jack hit a double and a triple. In the last inning he leaped high in the
air to

catch a throw from the outfield and tagged the runner at


plate,
is

home
Leary

which saved the game. The coach

said,

"That Jack
chatting at

a rock."
I

When

returned home, Salinas and Flora

Lu were

the kitchen table.

"Where have you been?" asked Salinas. "Out and about. Did you have breakfast?" "Yes. But it was pretty strange to wake up and find the house empty. We thought we had hallucinated everything." I poured
myself a cup of coffee. "We've been talking about you," said Flora Lu, smiling. "We decided you may be a hotshot psychologist but you need

36

Looking Back

some help

in the Uttle

down-to-earth things, Hke


"

how

to dress.

And how
"

to cut your hair

and what music to Hsten to and how


aesthetic than this facuhy-club

to

make

these sessions

more
here.

atmosphere you've got going

So

I'd

be honored," Flora
I

my

house next weekend.

"if you'd come to could arrange experiments with some


life is like

Lu continued,

interesting subjects

and show you what

in the first-class

me to meet her at Birdland, the Manhattan nightclub where top jazz musicians like her husband played and hung
out.
I found Flora Lu sitting with a black-haired named from Morocco. We listened to music Malaca, spellbinder for awhile and talked to the musicians who came by the table. I

lounge." Flora Lu told

When

got there

Malaca was a model whose

picture

was on

the cover of Holiday

Magazine, she had been married to a member of the royal family of Iran, who had given her a lot of money and treated her badly. She was looking for new meaning in her changed life.
Flora

Lu had

told
I

also told her that

Malaca about our drugs. But Flora Lu had might be an extraterrestrial so she watched
half open.
I

me

closely with her

mouth

found her overwhelmingly


for arranging such inter-

attractive,

and was

grateful to Flora
for the

Lu

esting

companionship

upcoming neurological experiments.

Then Maynard took


higher and higher.

the stage, your basic young-man-with-a-

horn, standing with legs apart, body arched, screeching, soaring

Around midnight we
thirty minutes

piled into a black limousine parked in

front of the cabaret, rolled along the


later pulled into

way

to a large

West Side Highway, and some woods and up a gravel driveTudor house. There were two Jaguars out front.
Lu Ferguson: Maynard Ferguson was
world
class

Maynard and

Flora

for Stan Kenton, a

jazzman

in the 1950s.

a trumpet soloist His wife Flora Lu

introduced Asian design to the early drug culture.

37

TIMOTHY LEARY
"Let

me show you your new


living

laboratory," said Flora.

huge fireplace. U-shaped couch, deep and soft, Rubbed-wood paneling and bookshelves made the flashy nonobjective paintings stand out. One wall was lined with electronic
plushly carpeted.

The

room was enormous and

framed the giant

sound equipment and yards of record albums. What impressed me about the luxury of this room was the sure
erotic intelligence with

which each

detail

had been arranged.

"Come, I'll show you your room." Lu opened a door off the long upstairs hallway. "I hope be comfortable here." The floor and the huge bed were you'll
Flora

covered with

furs,

splashed with pink

silk pillows.

Wood

and

velvet. Mirrors.

"Would you like to see our room?" she asked. The master bedroom was a soft cove of lace,
and
It

tassels, drapes,

furs.

Rubenesque paintings and Tantric yantras.

a delightful introduction to hedonic consciousness. Indeed the very existence of pleasure as a way of life had been

was

unknown
I

to me.

had

lived

much

of

my

adult

life

amid the usual upper-middle


machines used by pro-

class comforts, the habitation/functional

fessional people in this era.

But these were more than convenient quarters. Flora Lu had designed a temple to seduce each sense into rapture, to entice the

harem embrace. In this baroque bordello-shrine hedonic education was initiated.


body
I

into a

my

was, at the time, a successful robot

respected at Harvard,

clean-cut, witty, and, in that inert culture, unusually creative.

Though

had attained the highest ambition of the young American intellectual, I was totally cut off from the body and senses. My clothes had been obediently selected to fit the young professional image. Even after one hundred drug sessions I routinely listened to pop music, drank martinis, ate what was put beI

fore me.

38

Looking Back

art by pushing my body around to "sacred but this tourism had nothing to do with direct aesthetic places," sensation. My nervous system was cocooned in symbols; the event
I

had "appreciated"

was always second-hand. Art was an academic concept, an institution. The idea that one should live one's Hfe as a work of art had never occurred to me.
After

we took

psilocybin,

sat

on the couch

in Flora Lu's Ely-

sian chamber, letting

my

right cerebral hemisphere slowly

open

up to

direct sensual reception. Flora

Lu and Maynard

started

teaching

me

eroticism

the yoga of attention.

Each moment was

examined for sensual


kinesthetic joy.
I

delicious grace of moving possibility. one's hand, not as part of a learned survival sequence, but for

The

was wearing
I

the silk shirt and velvet trousers that Flora Lu,

true to her promise to be

my

fashion coordinator, had

left

on

my

showered. Flora Lu was wearing light blue silk. Maynard was a Florentine noble garbed in tight fitting velvet pants.

bed while

In a

Moroccan
fire

caftan,

Malaca was

soft,

touchable.

burned gently in the hearth. The air was scented with incense. His sensitized ears now as big as the Arecibo Dish, Maynard swayed with pleasure. Flora Lu floated around the room, her face transfigured with delight. Malaca blossomed into a flower
of great beauty, her classic features of an Egyptian frieze.

now

stylized

with the dignity

My
my

eyes connected with hers.

We

rose as one

and walked to
arms around

the sun porch. She turned,

came

to me, entwined her

neck.

We were

two

sea creatures.

The mating process

in this universe

began with the fusion of moist lips producing a soft-electric rapture, which irradiated the entire body. We found no problem maneuvering the limbs, tentacles, and delightful protuberances with

which we were miraculously equipped

in the transparent honeythat zero surrounded, bathed, and susliquid gravity atmosphere tained us.

39

TIMOTHY LEARY
This was
chedelics.
It

my

first

startled

sexual experience under the influence of psyme to learn that in addition to being instru-

ments of philosophic revelation, mystical unity, and evolutionary insight, psychedelic drugs were very powerful aphrodisiacs.

Malaca was
the sofa.
I

upstairs taking a bubble bath.

Maynard dozed on

stood by the glass doors in the dawn, aware that

my

sunrise-watching index had risen dramatically since initiating this


research into brain-change.

Flora

Lu

carried in a tray containing a silver coffee pot, a silver

pitcher of cream,

two porcelain cups, and


table

bowl of

apples, ba-

nanas, and shiny green grapes. She placed the tray on a low
sitting

and rode gravity down

to a

position on the

rug. "I

want

to continue the discussion

we

were having
I felt

last night."

a flush of

warmth
I

in

my

body, as

my face muscles softened

into a smile. "Yes,


ness.

remember." The secret-of-the-universe busiin front of the fire

We
Flora

had been

sitting

harmoniously

when

Lu leaned toward me. "It's all Sex, don't you see?" It had all become clear. Black jazz combos playing the boogie. Swedish blondes disrobing on a tropical beach. Tanned slim Is-

boys belly dancing to frenzied drums. Soft laughter from dark corners and behind bushes. The real secret of the universe
raeli

was

that everyone

knew

it

but me.

few days after the session I asked Aldous Huxley what he thought about the erotogenic nature of psychedelic drugs. His immediate reaction was agitation. "Of course this is true, Timothy, but we've stirred

can stimulate aesthetic

up enough trouble suggesting that drugs and religious experiences. I strongly urge
"

you not

to let the sexual cat out of the bag.

My

first

reaction to the aphrodisiac revelation

was

to have a

good laugh

at my own expense. We had been running around the land offering mystic visions and instant personality-change to

40

Looking Back

priests, prisoners,

and professors, and


(if

all

the time

we were

un-

wittingly administering the key


to enhanced sex.
it

used in the right circumstances)

take so long

What an inhibited square I had been. Why did for me to stumble on this fact? We had long rec-

ognized that these drugs tremendously intensified bodily sensations


taste, smell, touch, colors,

we knew

sound, motion, breathing. And that in the right setting, strong empathetic connections
set

formed between people. By programming


the philosophic, spiritual, or scientific,

and

setting

toward

we had

steered ourselves

perversely
suality

away from an otherwise


affection.

inevitable heightening of sen-

and

unrealistic about one thing: It simply wasn't poscensor everybody's experience as we had censored our own. About this time we learned, to our dismay, that hip pleasure-seekers in Las Vegas, Beverly Hills, and Aspen were saysible to

Huxley was

ing

LSD

(a

psychedelic drug none of us had yet tried) meant "Let's


discoveries

Strip

Down." These

came

as a delicious shock to our

prudish academic minds. It had never occurred to us that


treated with such deference

this experience,

which we

party item. (Except for searching this area with cooperative Harvard undergraduates.) It was that night's experience with Malaca that alerted me to the
certainty that our G-rated philosophic drugs

and awe, could become a popular that rascal Dick, who was already re-

would eventually be
I

used recreationally.
Since this sexual awakening at the Fergusons' house,

have
the

found myself dutybound

as a scientific-philosopher to pass

on

Richard "Dick" Alpert: American psychologist Alpert co-directed the Harvard Psychedelic Drug Research Project with Leary. In 1967, during a pilgrimage to India, Alpert became a devotee of Neem Karoli Baba, a Hindu guru, and changed his own name to Baba Ram Dass. His classic book Be

Here

Now

helped popularize Eastern spirituality in America.

41

TIMOTHY LEARY
information that psychedelic drugs, with appropriate set and setperhaps more ting, can be intensely aphrodisiac. This statement

than any other

makes puritans and

fanatic moralists furious.

seemed natural, somehow, that Malaca and I would stay together. When I drove back to Newton Sunday night, we dropped
It

by her place for some of her belongings and she in my home.


It

set

up residence

was hard

for her to adjust to

my

domestic scene: two noisy

kids,

crowds of graduate students, and researchers always talking shop. After a week I still saw Malaca as a temple dancer-divinity

from the 33rd dynasty. But


in the

it

soon became obvious that up here

middle class 20th century she was out of place, turning into
girl.

a petulant, spoiled Arabian

The image from

the drug session

was slowly

fading.

42

The Legend

of Billy Will

I:

Introducing Billy Will

THE LAST THREE YEARS, ROSEMARY AND I HAVE BEEN enough to spend much of our time with a young man named Billy Will and his woman, Carol, who are to become

DURING fortunate

folk-hero mythic figures of the 20th century.

He He He He He He

was more

fearless

than Buffalo

Bill.

was more mischievous than

the Pied Piper.

has changed the culture more than Henry Ford.

has traveled more than Odysseus.

closer to nature than John Muir and Paul Bungar. was younger than Bob Dylan. His global ubiquity was more extensive than the C.I.A.

was

He was funnier than Mullah Nasruddin. He was more likable than Will Rogers.
His
fruits of

passage have blossomed more than Johnny Ap-

pleseed.

He smiled as sweetly as the Baby Krishna. He and his woman, Carol, may be the only hope
evolution on this planet.

of

human

43

TIMOTHY LEARY
Rosemary and
totypes of a
I

believe Billy Will

new

species.

Homo

Evolutans^

and Carol to be mutant proMan-woman aware


all

of him-herself in harmonious relationship to

other forms of

energy on this planet. Homo Galactansf Every reader of this Legend will recall having met Bill Will and perhaps even Carol at some time during the last six years. Or

perhaps you have


people

just

know him by

read about him in the media. Although few his actual name (do we?) he has been
J.

roundly denounced in every one of the Man's media. As

Edgar

Hoover might represent the old side of the generation gap, Billy Will is the young side. As always, he is a smiling young man with a bad reputation. If you have had any dealings with him (Carol always stays at home) you will remember him as unforgettable. I recall a conversation with a famous criminal lawyer around Seattle. He was talking about Billy Will and said: "That brotherhood of Billy Will is the finest group of men I've ever known.
They've changed me plenty. I used to be the best criminal lawyer in town. Win most, lose a few. Since I have been representing Bill

and

his friends,

it's

been
says

like
is

magic. Everything goes right.

We

can't lose.

And

all Bill

something about "trusting the Tao."

Billy Will

was conceived

in

1943 and born

in

August 1944. He's

a Leo, that's for sure.

Carol was born in 1945, and she's a Taurus with plenty going
for her in Cancer.

They were both born at the birth of the New Age, whatever you want to call it. The beginnings of electronics, atomics, psychedelics, and the holy (wholly) erotics. Bill was brought up on a farm, and at least one of his grandparents was a full-blooded American Indian. He was hunting with a .22 at the age of seven and used to go on three-day pack trips with his dogs when he was eight.
44

Looking Back

Billy

was precocious

in

many ways. Dynamically

energetic.

Brashly unrepressed. Utterly fearless. Very Animal. He rarely complained or said a negative thing.

His family moved from Oklahoma to Southern California when

was ten. He was never good at school. He wouldn't pay attention and would look around the room, out the window, walk around the
Bill

class

room always moving

to the center of energy or attention,

would

secretly study things he

desk. Like snake rattles

and

brought to school and kept in his petrified wood. Once he was caught

with a dirty book. He was never aggressive or sassy, but still he had the reputation of being an incorrigibly uncooperative child, because when asked
a question he

would

just grin as

though to

say,

"Why do you
told his
first-

want

to ask

me

that.^"

Billy Will wouldn't learn to read and write.

He

grade teacher and

those that followed that the readingest people he had met were all uptight and the happiest people he ever met back in Oklahoma never bothered to read or write and until
all

he saw a good reason to he

just

wasn't interested.

He was
punitive.

often punished for being mischievous, and his cheerful,

unrepentant attitude sometimes made teachers angrier and more

His report card would say such things


in school

and no respect

for authority."

asking impertinent questions not below average in intelligence.


achiever."

"He has no interest "He disrupts class by and making funny remarks." "He is
as:

On

all tests

of non-verbal peris

formance he produces very high scores." "He

a classic under-

"He

is

good

at athletics, but refuses to

go out for

organized varsity sports." Bill Will did learn to read in 1966, in order to read Psychedelic Prayers during acid trips. After that he quickly mastered the reading of the English language in order to peruse the Sacred Books of the East, occasionally the L,A. Free Press, and mainly to study

45

TIMOTHY LEARY
certain technical

manuals like bee-keeping, simple chemistry, Indian customs, and the like. plant lore,

As
Bill

a long-time psychologist

considered

it

of great interest that

Will could rapidly comprehend the most difficult technical and philosophic works and still could not write. To be specific he could write only two words, his given name. He told Rosemary
once, "I finally
a

saw

a reason for reading, but

haven't run across

good reason for writing yet."

Which
were
for

brings us to the story of

how

day there

was

a police raid

on the

Will got his name. One valley where Bill and Carol
Bill

living

with the Brotherhood. The authorities were looking


valley in

someone who wasn't there and came over the

two

and six squad cars. was on the run, at the time. Although Bill himself was almost never arrested, and never, not once, brought to trial, there happened to be a phony warrant out for him on a charge of stealing oranges. So when the police ran all round the valley checking I.D.'s, Bill, who was out in the corn field at the time, knew he had to come up with a new name fast, and one he could
helicopters
Bill

spell.

When

the government agent, short-haired with black city


suit,

shoes and a dark blue


Bill

was

ready.

He knew

sweating in the hot sun, reached him. how to spell Bill, and he had learned

once to his amusement that "double you" changed Bill to Will. So when the agent asked, "What is your name, son?" The response was Bill Will. And so he was known thereafter.

46

Looking Back

II:

How

Bill

Will Stole the Elixir of Life

Billy Will

grew up

as a teenager in the last years of the Industrial

Empire.

The
it

social insanity of the times

only the
justice.

mind of

a Jonathan Swift or a George Orwell could

had become so complex that do


state education

There was a system of compulsory


chanical people
flimsy

and comme-

pulsory military training calculated to turn out millions of

who

lived in

huge housing

tracts,

thousands of

plywood box houses all set in endless, monotonous rows. Strict and efficient brainwashing techniques were used to keep

from thinking independently. Pavlovian techniques of mass conditioning trained and rewarded citizens for performing
the populace

routine tasks.

The

official

moral climate

in the

United States was puritanical


state-religion

Spartan. Electronic Calvinism.

The

encouraged

cit-

izens to be hard-working, self-sacrificing, emotionally

and sen-

sually restrained.

was

a self-righteous self-pity.

stition fears

imposed upon the people The Government sponsored superand scapegoating witchcraft and invented imaginary
official attitude

The

enemies surrounding the virtuous citizenry. The citizenry was constantly reminded that they felt bad and the reason that they felt bad (in spite of their industrious obedience)
at

was the fault of vague subversive immoral forces continually work to frustrate the American dream. The chief means of disseminating the national religion was teleset in the center of the family-shrine

vision.

TV

Every one of the 100 million cracker-box houses had a room. With amazing

concentration the citizens would focus their worshipful vision on

TV programs
ple morality

over eight hours a day. The television indoctrination was straight Manicheanism. Sim-

dramas (including
after hour. In

so-called

news broadcasts) were

presented hour

each of these dramas, forces grap-

47

TIMOTHY LEARY
pled with and finally defeated Evil. This warfare with subversiveness required

enormous

taxes.
all

Billy Will and his friends, like

teenagers, quickly picked

up

on the

basic message:

There were the good guys and bad guys. The good guys were diligent and serious, got good grades, went to college, spent two years in the Marine Corps, got a job, and
married a
girl

pin curlers.

who quickly changed into Good guys lived in a tract

a sexless creature with


like

everyone

else

and

watched
It

TV

was easy

every night like Billy's parents. to spot a good guy. He wore his hair short like a

plucked chicken,

he

dressed

in

standard-regulation rumbled

clothes, either a sport coat or a sport shirt, serious, sincere look

and he wore a grim,

on

his face.

They were dumb or lazy at school, didn't get to even go to junior college. They didn't have regular jobs and didn't get to live in tract houses. They were

The bad guys were

also easy to identify.

rolling stones. Traveled a lot. Lived in flashy city apartments or


else in

romantic, primitive pads or hideouts. The bad guys had foreign backgrounds and international connections. There was a

Mediterranean or Middle Eastern whiff to them. They didn't have credit cards, not even gas credit cards, but they often carried lots
of cash.

They hung out in bands or brotherhoods bound together by some sort of tribal loyalty, and their women were pretty and very sexy and were fanatically devoted. They all ended up in jail, in
exile,

One

or gloriously riddled with FBI bullets. thing was sure: The bad guys never ended up in tract

houses.

The whole business was presented so clearly that there was never any doubt which side you wanted to be on. do anyBilly and his friends knew right away that they would
thing to avoid a tract house in an Orange County development.
In high school Billy

and

his friends

pooled their money and

48

Looking Back

like

bought a huge second-hand Cadillac. They wore flashy clothes TV gangsters and rock musicians. They were much influenced by
Elvis,

brought a raw, natural, Southern sexual beat into the car radios. Music was very important to them. The blasting,
impertinent eroticism of the electric guitar became the perfect expression for this first generation of McLuhanite outlaws.

who

The high school girls loved Billy and his friends. By the second year in high school Billy and his brothers were
engaged
in exquisite contact

with the natural enemy of the rebel:

the police.

they would do silly-kid things like stand in the sidewalk and when a squad car pulled by, shout defiance, and let go with

At

first

a few rotten eggs. the Cadillac.

Then

they'd run

down an

alley

and roar

off in

They were always hustling in a good-humored way. Some shopand robbery. Never for the money itself. It was just the righteous, manly tribal thing to do. Like young Comanche braves
lifting

collecting coups.

Then came dope. Marijuana came up from Mexico, and Billy and Grennie and Tom and Jeff would get high driving to school. High school was
a funny

game behind

grass.

Grass provided a sharper insight into

the really weird, uptight things their teachers and parents do.

Weed was

great for balling, too.

would Their lovemaking was long,

slow, serpentine, polymorphous, erotic. None of the chicks that hung out with the Brotherhood would ever want to make it with
a heavy-handed, pumping, beer-drinking jock after the cool sex

of grass.

Sometimes the grass would be scarce when the Feds would close down the border, and then, as always, the kids would fall back

on the "bad" drugs reds and whites and even booze. "Let's get loaded, man. Anything to feel good and escape the plastic." The reds (barbiturates) produced a silly, dizzy dreamlike feeling, and then everything would get fuzzy and sloppy like a drunk.
49

TIMOTHY LEARY
"Red-Users" became messy looking and unhealthy; but at
least

they weren't uptight like the shorthairs and boozers. The whites (speed) were better and worse. They made you feel good, good, good. Not the subtle sensual euphoria of grass but
jazzy, alert, energetic. Speed. Speed. Speed.
faster. Outspeed the fuzz. Talk incessantly.

Gas the motor. Rap Move. Faster. Speed.

Billy
pills.

and the Brothers went through a crazy period behind the

Mad-Wolf used
Street at
Billy

up on speed and roar down the Main 3:00 a.m. shooting up store windows.
to get

would hide behind

curtains trembling in fear

and run out

in the streets naked.

Fantastic

amphetamine paranoias would develop. Quarrels. Suspicions. You worried all the time about raids and informers.

At one time during the speed days the Brotherhood almost disbanded. But all the time they were learning about life and about
themselves and about society.

They

inevitably drifted into dealing.

A trip to Juarez or Tijuana


of
pills

to score a few kilos or a hat

box

full

and bring

it

across

under the floorboard.


This was adventure. Outwitting the feds. Tension. Animal
ertness.
al-

Courage. time in 1963, Carol was at the hairdressers. She was working as a go-go girl. Under the dryer she picked up a Saturday Evening Post and read about a group of Harvard professors who

One

had a new drug which produced


the highest trip of
Billy.
all

ecstatic visions

and guaranteed

time. Carol brought the magazine

home

to

Evening Post pious, grim, cornball warnings about danger, brain-damage, and
the article
typical Saturday

The tone of

was

psychosis.
Billy told

me about
I

his reaction years later.

"You know,

don't

read so hot, so

just

looked at the pictures. There was one of

50

Looking Back

twenty people beach smiling

sitting

stoned in the lotus position on a beautiful like angels. And one of a chick standing in the

And pictures of you Harvard And a of guys laughing. picture Ralph Metzner, bearded, looking at a flower. And one of a meditation room with oriental prints
waves, gone into some ecstasy place.

and a statue of the Buddha and the Buddha looked high too." "I said to Carol, 'It's unfair. How come these Harvard dudes
get to be high all the time legally

and we knock ourselves out to


"

score second-grade bush from Tijuana?'

By this time, Billy and the Brotherhood had reached a point of enormous self-confidence. They didn't wait around like the shorthairs to have

government give them something. They just moved out to get what they righteously needed. And when they had to have this new, super-high, blow-your-

mind, ecstasy drug called LSD. Billy sent out feelers to the L.A. and Mexican drug underground but the news was puzzling. LSD was legal, believe it or
not, but

you had

to have
it.

some

sort of middle class, professional

connections to score

Finally they learned of a psychiatrist in Beverly Hills who had been turning on Gary Grant and other film notables to LSD. Billy

got the shrink's address, and he and

Mad-Wolf and Negrito


and

got

Halloween masks and


first

plastic toy pistols

set off to pull the

LSD

caper. the Beverly Hills

The door to was going on.

mansion was open, and a party

Billy and Mad-Wolf and Negrito walked in and ordered the surprised host and his guests to line up against the

Ralph Metzner: A close associate of Leary during his Harvard and Millbrook at Haryears, Metzner was a post-doctoral fellow in psychopharmacology vard Medical School as well as a key player in the Harvard Psychedelic Drug
Project.

His Psychedelic Review became a major

scientific journal

during the

experimental psychedelic years.

51

TIMOTHY LEARY
wall.

"Take anything you like," said the shrink. "Where is the LSD?" said Billy. The shrink began to laugh, "In vials in the re-

frigerator.

And have
home.

good

trip."

There v^ere about 100

vials.

They divided

the haul three

ways

and
one

split for

was typical except more so. He took had ever felt in his life. The colors. The sounds. Carol became a goddess and got a contact high just from Billy's energy. After a few hours Billy took three more. Then the God trip really started. Billy went through the whole evoluBilly's first

LSD

experience

vial

and

felt

better than he

tionary cycle. Hells. Terrors. Deaths and rebirths. For several

hours

Billy just

looked around the house repeating the word

"plastic."

And

laughing.

Carol wasn't worried because Billy looked so beautiful and his


face

was shining and

his

body was so graceful and warm and

sensitive.

So she took some too.

Billy stayed

for 16 hours

and then

high for a week, until the acid was gone. He slept ate some fruit. Then he said to Carol, "Call

the real estate dealer


starting a

and

sell

the house.

And

the furniture. We're

today." went to look for Mad-Wolf. He had moved all the furBilly niture except a rug out of his bedroom and was sitting on the
floor in the lotus position,

new

life

which he had never done before,


eyes met,

watching a candle. For eight hours.

When
more

Billy

came

in, their

and they laughed. "No

kid-stuff cops

and robbers. Right?"

we going to do, Billy?" "I dunno. But we ain't coming down." They set off to find Negrito who had jumped
"But what are
split for the desert

into his car

and

and had spent two days on a mountain top laughing and crying and praising God. From that time on Billy and his friends did nothing else except try to get higher themselves and to turn on the rest of the

world.

52

Looking Back

"Until something comes along that does the job better, our best hope is dope," said Billy Will.

Ill:

Was Just
On
one of our

The Chromosome Breakage Frosting on the Cake


1969,
Bill

trips to the airport in

Will said to me:

they came out with that chromosome breakage story, that was just frosting on the cake." I said, "I don't know what you mean, Billy?"

"Man, when

with amusement, "Well, back in 1965, when the government decided to educate kids about drugs they sent around some medical cats to all the high schools warning us
Bill said,

glancing at

me

and scaring
syn syn

us.

was eighteen

at the time

and didn't understand

the medical terms.


. . . . . .

When
. . .

they said

LSD
is

causes permanent brain

thought that

how you say it? We syn syndrome meant we would stay "high" permanently. There
that

was much 1967 that

rejoicing in the Brotherhood. Then,

when

they said in

the effects could be passed

on

to your children, well,

man, that was our highest dream come

true."

IV:

The Coincidence of the Moslem and the Bee


interesting things to

False

One

of the

more

me

about

Billy

Will was his

understanding and practical use of the power of Coincidence. His life was marked by a continual series of fortuitous, favorable
events.

This phenomenon, which Carl Jung called synchronicity, and

Carl Jung: The Swiss psychologist's theories of the collective unconscious

53

TIMOTHY LEARY
which primitive CathoHcs describe (and pray
I

for) as miracles,
is

is,

think, best described as Conscious Luck, that

the inherited or

learned ability to tune in to the flow of energy, sense instinctively what is happening and about to happen, and adjust so that one
receives the benefit (or avoids the

harm) of what

is

taking form

around one.

When

would ask
life,

Billy

about the recurrence of fortunate ac-

cidents in his

he would grin and use this word, which he

pronounced with the calculated stutter which accompanied every one of his polysyllabic breaks in role, "Co-co-co-coincidence."
This particular coincidence of the False Moslem and the Bee room of a carpet shop in the native quarter of a Middle Eastern city. Billy and Grennie were in town on busi-

occurred in the back

ness

who had

and were referred to the owner of a carpet shop. The owner ceremoniously ushered them into the backroom where

they sat on the cushioned rug and smoked dark, heavy, resinous tobacco, and drank mint tea. After a while, the three men started
to talk business.

Right away Billy flashed that the dude was lying. He looked at Grennie and saw that he was picking up on the same thing.
After a while, the carpet merchant sensed that he wasn't getting across and began protesting his innocence in a loud voice and
raised his
"I

hand

in

anger to swear a solemn oath.


faith as a

swear by

my

Moslem

that

am

telling

you the
in

truth."

At that point a bee


the hot,

who had

been buzzing by the


in the finger.

window

smoky room stung the dude The carpet merchant shrieked in pain, and shook his hand and sucked his finger. Then he looked at Billy and nodded.

and archetypes of man's basic natures reflect Leary's belief in genetic types. Jung, like Leary, was a Ph.D. and a religious leader and founder of a new

humanism.

54

Looking Back

The

deal

was then arranged

the

way

it

should have been ar-

ranged and

Billy said to Grennie, "Perfect. Perfect. Perfect."

V.

Any

Agree Are a Public Health Menace


The people
in this valley violate the following defined by Public Health regulations:

Qualified Social Worker Would That Billy Will and His Friends

minimum standards

1.

There

is

no

electricity.

The two

KUA

electric generators, in

excellent condition,
for a sauna

were traded to a carpenter


gate.

in

exchange

and a psychedelic sculptured

Mr. William

Will, their spokesman, claimed that the generators

made an

offensive noise

and created smog.

2.

The

nearest approved municipal water supply

is

twenty miles

and the water piped down

away. Wells and springs have been tapped high in the canyons to the valley. There are eleven such

unapproved pipe-systems, but the people seem to prefer water which bubbles out of a well on the valley meadow. Although
there
is

no

chlorine, fluoride, or other authorized chemicals

in the water,

Mr. Will praised

it

highly, saying that the old

cowboys and the Indians before them came for miles source which they called the "Drinking Spring."

to this

3.

Federal, state,

and county agents should be advised that the


is

road to the valley


at their

extremely rough. City sedans will proceed

own

risk.

The people

in the valley are completely

uninterested in road improvement.

55

TIMOTHY LEARY
4.

The milk

raw, unpasteurized, and sometimes drunk warm. They milk their cows by hand. The barn would not pass sanis

itary inspection.

5.

There are twenty adult dogs and thirty-nine puppies. All fiftynine dogs are unlicensed and without rabies shots. The people
spend much time talking, even gossiping about the dogs' behavior. They seem to treat the dogs like human
in the valley

beings.

Mr. Will

stated:

"We

learn a lot

from the dogs."

6.

Except for the winter, these people live in primitive teepees. This is below the minimum standards set by the Bureau of
Indian Affairs which has succeeded in moving most Indians
into houses.

The
is

toilet facilities are

squatting holes in the

ground. Water
7. In the

piped to the teepees via garden hoses.

winter the people inhabit cottages, unheated except for

fireplaces

and potbelly

stoves.

8.

Most

of the

men go

barefoot in spite of the rough desert

terrain.

9.

They
There

refuse to kill insects or use insecticides.

10.

is

no

fish

or meat in their diet.

11.

they are forced to use candles and primitive lamps. They employ hand-operated butter churns and ice cream mixers.

Having no

electricity,

12. There are

no clocks or time-pieces

in the valley.

13.

Although their young children run barefoot in a region which abounds in rattlesnakes, they refuse to exterminate the crea56

Looking Back

tures.

They trap these deadly reptiles with hinged sticks and release them at the uninhabited end of the valley where they

remain a menace to others.

14.

They do not use modern, scientific methods of They plant according to the phases of the moon.

fertilizing.

15.

When

ill,

healers

and

they prefer to go to osteopaths, chiropractors, faith eccentric M.D.'s. They have a primitive suspicion

of orthodox M.D.'s and conventional drugs.

16. Their babies are delivered at

home by

the fathers without the

presence of an M.D. This is a direct violation of state law. Instead of taking normal obstetrical precautions, they celebrate the time of birth as a festival.

17.

The

children are not registered with any government agency.


literally

This means that their children

do not

exist as citizens

of the state! Furthermore, the children can thus avoid com-

pulsory education and will not be registered for the draft.

18.

The poverty of

their cultural

life is

aboriginal.

They have no

television or radio. They read no newspapers or magazines. They are hopelessly out of touch with the American way of

swimming, sitting around campfires. They smoke incessantly from briar pipes or hand-rolled cigarettes. The few books in the valley
life.

Their amusements are childish

hiking,

are occult treatises

and

non-scientific technical works.

19.

The people in about modern


line

the valley are guided by crude superstitions


life.

They

particularly

shun

plastic,

and gaso-

motors, and go out of their

way

to avoid metal.

57

TIMOTHY LEARY
20. In spite of their apparent poverty they seem to have no financial worries or aspirations. Each man leaves the valley three

days a month or one month a year to work "on the outside," thus maintaining their low standard of living. It is unlikely
that they pay any income taxes.

21. In summary, these people live most of their

life

as

though the

United States of America did not

about

exist. When questioned Mr. Will laughed and said, matters legal political "There is only one set of laws, and we learn about them from

and

animals, the planets, and the stars."

worker would agree that William Will and his neighbors fall below the minimum public health standards and should be considered criminal wards of the state and menaces to

Any

qualified social

society.

58

Body

The

Clitoris
1993

This essay presents the viewpoint of

an uninfor-

century male. These primitive, amateur, naive observations are designed to stimulate thought about four crucial
issues:

NOTE. med 20th

1.

The

invisible, pervasive, relentless,

unadmitted repression and

dehumanization of v^omen and children by armed Male Authorities.

From 25,000 BC

until today.

2.

The masculine

glorification of the phallus

monstrous, mon-

umental, gigantic, towering, penetrating, potent, pov^erful,


strong, competent, forceful,

commanding.

3.

The contemptuous demonization by males of the female genitaha. The depreciating word "clit" denies the central importance of this wonder organ. The most insulting putdown of another man is to call him a "cunt" or "pussy." The recent
usage of the derogation "dick," according to tabulated wordcounts is almost exclusively used by women.

4.

The awesome
"organ,"

significance of the Clitoris in

human

life

and

species evolution.

The

Clitoris

may

THE GENETIC BRAINLOBE


61

be the most important of our species which

TIMOTHY LEARY
has been totally ignored, trivialized, and demonized by masculine culture.

Male Definitions of the Clitoris


According to Marshall
the realities

McLuhan

the

words we use

to fabricate

we

inhabit.

the Clitoris as:

"A SMALL(?) ERECTILE

The American Heritage Dictionary defines ORGAN AT THE UP-

PER END OF THE VULVA, HOMOLOGOUS WITH THE penis." In my viewpoint, this definition reflects the ultimate oppressive humiliation of Humans by Masculine Authorities.

Scientific Definitions of the "Penis"

Brushing aside this hysterical masculine mysticism, we can agree is an impressive plumbing tool which performs two valuable bio-engineering survival functions and one important
that the penis

neurological function:

1.

One or more Quarts of Urine Per Day. QUPD. About five times a day, the male unzips and takes his penis in hand and squirts out a stream of urine.
Urination.

2. Ejaculation.

The penis

also squirts out

around 300,000 sperm

per orgasm (SPO).

3.

Psychological-Neurological function.

In discussing these controversial issues let us acknowledge the

enormous

erotic

and symbolic

significance of the Phallus in

male

mythology.

62

Body

make men feel like "Men." The orgasms make males feel good.
Erections

throbbing, pulsating

The penis

is

the sword, the lance, the tower, the plough, the

very essence of man's potent

power over

the submissive, handi-

capped, genetically disadvantaged, semi-plegic woman. Indeed, the Sage of 19th Century Sexuality, Sigmund Freud, in
a bizarre
fit

of hebephrenic silliness fantasized that

woman's

basic

neurosis

was caused by "penis envy!"

Parable:
talks

The boy

is

confused.

He

says to his father,

"The teacher
it

about the 'vagina.' But the guys in the school yard called a 'cunt.' What is the difference between a vagina and a cuntV

The

father replied,

"The vagina

is

warm,

juicy,

sweet thing
is

designed to
individual

make men feel happy and who owns the vagina."

strong.

The cunt

the

The Vagina
The hipper Random House Dictionary (1987)
as "the passage leading
defines the

Vagina

from the uterus to the vulva


not the

in certain

female mammals."
but the VaginaCervix-Ovary (V.C.O.) organ system which performs two unbethe penis
is

The homologue of

clitoris

lievably complicated biogenetic functions.

1. Pissing:

The V.C.O. contains

the urethra

which

ejects

around

one

QUPD.

(Notice that the female usually does not handle

her urinary disposal equipment. The mechanics of "pissing on" something or someone, so central to male dominance psy-

chology

is

not a central part of female mythology. Except, of

course, as an exquisitely

rowdy form

of sexual aesthetics.)

63

TIMOTHY LEARY
2. Conceiving:

The female reproductive system produces one egg month and nurtures the fertiUzed egg for nine months.

The
There
is

Clitoris

no male homologue for the Clitoris. The Clitoris has no plumbing or sperm-egg functions.

Like the Eyeball, the Clitoris is a sensory organ, an extension of the brain, which happens to be tactically located betv^een the legs of females. From the evolutionary viewpoint the Clitoris is a

bundle of neurons which might be called the brain of DNA. It is fascinating to speculate about the genetic significance of
this neurologically enriched organ.
It

could be argued that the Clitoris assigns to the female the

basic
cies

and ultimate power of determining the survival of the speand the direction of species mutation.

i.e.

Macho-sexist Darwinism preaches the survival of the fittest the strongest, toughest males. The strong males who can man-

age to arouse the Clitoris are selected for mating. In most species it is the males who are loaded

plumage, the gaudy markings. It is the display, exhibit, show-off to attract, to arouse the Clitoris of the
elegant, discriminating female to be aroused

down with the males who strut, dance,


by the most appeal-

ing sperm deliverer.

What Darwinism Called Natural Selection Turns Out To Be Clitoral Aesthetic Choice
Even more humiliating to male pretensions
is

the fact that once

the 300,000 sperm are spurted into the vaginal-cervical system

they are forced to thrash, splash, and swim up the fallopian tubes often described by poets as the Boulevard of Broken Genes.

64

Body
These bizarre self-serving scenarios of male biologists would
have us believe that the 300,000 sperm immediately engage in

some sv^eaty, Olympic sv^imming ing, and flagellating.

race, frantically

bumping,

tv^ist-

Clitoridectomy
The
crucial importance of the Clitoris
is

demonstrated by the

rit-

ual of Clitoridectomy.

The 1975 American Heritage Dictionary contains no


African and Islamic young
girls

reference

to this ultimately savage practice of the mutilation of one million

each year.
states that clitoridectomy

The 1987 Random House Dictionary


is

"the excision of the clitoris ... to curb sexual desire; female


"

circumcision.

Infibulation

The 1987 Random House Dictionary

defines infibulation as

"The

stitching together of the vulva, often after a CLITORIDECTOMY; leaving a small opening for the passage of urine and menstrual blood."

Again, the prudishly antique 1975 American Heritage Dictionary makes no reference to this brutal practice, which each year victimizes more humans than the unspeakable atrocities of the

Nazi Holocaust, Stalinist, and Maoist genocides. In African and Islamic countries, clitoridectomy
glorious "rite of passage" for

is

the standard,

young teenage

girls.

Remember,

the

word ISLAM means submission-obedience

to

Allah, the vengeful, stern, male god. Clitoridectomy is, therefore, a highly sophisticated religious ritual, the ultimate sacrifice of fe-

male humanity to male mastery.


65

TIMOTHY LEARY
Castration-Circumcision
Please

do not compare clitoridectomy with circumcision or


is

cas-

tration.

Circumcision
sitive flap

the removal of the foreskin

a useless, insen-

of flesh w^hich has no survival function or sensual po-

tential.

Riddle:

What do

they call the insensitive bag of skin at the base

of the penis?

Answer
penis
is

to Riddle:

called

The The man!

insensitive

bag of skin

at the base of the

Castration

is

a simple removal of the testicles. These sacks of


reflexes,

sperm are equipped with exaggerated pain-avoidance minimal pleasure responses.


Clitoridectomy, however,
the removal of the
is

but

like surgical blinding

or lobectomy,

most important lobe of the

brain.

Do we
To
sume
be
the

dare equate the

CLITORIS
full

to the soul?
clitoris,

clinical, after surgical

removal of the

do we

as-

woman
true?

cannot have

orgasm?

Is this

How would I know? A distressing question

arises. It is

obvious that, for thousands

of years, the female orgasm has been censored and suppressed by male rulers. A fierce taboo has ignored and even demonized the

female orgasm.

Here,

we must recall the Freudian

theory that depreciates CLIT-

ORAL

orgasms in favor of vaginal orgasms. This taboo about the clitoris is profound. Cloaked
This taboo
still

in silence.

In the texts written, of course, by white males.


exists in

America today. The American Heritage

66

Body
Dictionary gives three definitions of castration. The ridectomy is not mentioned.

word

clito-

The very concept of female orgasm

is

unacceptable in most

human

societies.

The image of
tural moralists.

v^oman writhing
in gratification,

in pleasure,

moaning and
all

excul-

ultantly screaming

is

intolerable to almost

most hip, modern Random House Dictionary writof course, by white males: "Orgasm: the physical and emoten, sensation at the peak of sexual excitation, and usually tional accompanied in the male by ejaculation."
Listen to the

The
by
its

crucial genetic fact

is this:

A woman
is

can have

many

re-

peated orgasms. The unwieldy male unit


sperm-delivery capacities.

embarrassingly limited

Parable:

Around 1966 Alex Haley,


for
I

the

legendary

African-

American writer interviewed me


the discussion,

Playboy magazine. During

fabricated the provocative exaggeration that a

female could enjoy as


session.

many

as

200 orgasms during a psychedelic

later I lectured at Reed College in Portland, room was so jammed that around 20 students sat The Oregon. I was also seated. behind me. on stage

few months

During back of the

Q&A a

somber, scholarly-looking
is

man

standing in the

hall said: "What

the scientific basis for your state-

ment

that a female can have

200 orgasms during a psychedelic

experience?"
Feigning confusion,
I

leaned back and whispered to the students


I

behind me, "What shall

say?"

young woman

replied: "Tell

him

the answer

is

'y^s.'

And

that they

come

in colors like the

rainbow."
it is

Now, at the end of the 20th century new metaphors about female sexuality.
67

possible to suggest

TIMOTHY LEARY

Why

Not Think of the

Clitoris

as the

Legendary Third Eye?

Clitoridectomy is like blinding the eyeball, removing the basic organ of neurological intelligence which so charmingly designs

human

evolution.

The fact that we are now aware of these matters and can discuss them is a good sign. I think. What do I know?

68

Life

Is

a Southern Exposure

Here's an essay suggested by Stan Bernstein.

He phoned me one
his opinion, the

afternoon and told


the

me

that, in

war between

North and South was

much more dangerous than the East-West War between the Cold Dust Twins, Brezhnev and Reagan. Since I had come to the same conclusion, I sat right down at the computer screen and digitized the following.

And

had a damn good time doing


tell.

it.

As you can

probably

Criminalizing the Natural and Naturalizing the Criminal

KNOWS THAT

LiFE

ON

THIS PLANET

EMERGED WAY
tropics.

EVERYONE down south


back then the

in the hot, thick,

steamy stew of the

Way

first

Hfe forms were lazy, single-celled, ameboid,

hot-tub hedonists with ambitious appetites. Everything was organic, natural.

Nothing was immoral, unauthorized, or

illegal.

In time, however, pre-programmed, mutually-stimulating food-

69

TIMOTHY LEARY
chain competitions

among

the squishy unicellulars led to procareerist self-improvement.

grams of physical

fitness

and

This, in turn led to acquisitive materialism

and the popularity

of Young, Upscale, Post-Protozoa technologies such as sharper


vision, high-fidelity aural reception, hinged-thumbs.

There was, a few hundred million years ago, a predictable consumer craze for high-tech hunting and fishing gear such as fangs,
bones, teeth, tusks.

And

high-fashion seasonal obsessions for erot-

ically attractive fur coats, feather boas, leather-ware, snakeskin

hip-huggers.
Later, younger generations of self-directed organisms developed auto-mobile bodies equipped with tentacles, wings, legs which allowed the social-climbing, trendy forms to squirm, crawl, walk,

or

fly

uptown

to the

more

exclusive, temperate, classier neighstreets,

borhoods, namely, 30th to 45th

north and south latitudes.

Human
Down

Species Also

Emerge

First in the Tropics

south in the lush, luxurious jungles of the equator, our


artificial

first

ancestors needed no
rious, dark-skinned

technologies for survival.

The

glo-

naked body was the instrument with which


environment.
jungles

the original individual

Transportation
cab.

human related to the downtown in the tropical

was by

pedi-

Food gathering involved manual delivery systems. Social relations and communication involved gestures, spoken words, dancing, strutting. The semioticians call this "Body Language." There was direct skin-tight experiential contact with the commodity markets and energy centers upon which human survival depends.

We're talking about real estate basics here. Solar energy; pure spring-fed water supply; cavernous homes with wood-burning
fireplaces.

Convenient neighborhood access to natural foods

70

Body
found
ments.
in the

handy vegetable,

fruit,

fowl,

fish,

and meat depart-

Our newborn ancestors, 25,000 years ago, were equipped with an additional powerful survival appliance. They had brains calibrated like ours, with 100 billion neurons. And each neuron, we

now

has the thought-processing capacity of an IBM-PC The software (i.e. the thoughts) which operated this awesome neural equipment was programmed to react to inrealize,

or Macintosh.

formation from the local environment.

The brand name


means, "Human,
"

for our species is homo sapiens sapiens. This the information-processor: the thinker about

thinking.

With

all

that

mainframe, super-power, parallel-processing,


infinity of

Neurological-Intelligence (N.I.) built into our black, fuzzy, tropical skulls


tellers

not to mention the

there

had to be a whole

lotta figuring

megabyte memory-bank going on in the

heads of our ancestors. Just as our bellies are designed to digest food, our human brains are designed to digest and process information. This inevitability leads to thinking about

why things keep

happening

like

they do.

What,

for example,

must we do

to satisfy the Power-Light-

Water-Grocery-Supply sources?
For example,
ter bill?

And

to

why droughts.-* Have we whom?


flesh

forgotten to pay the wa-

Why
grate?

do animals whose

What have we

provide our dinners decide to midone to our furry and feathered friends to
the powers of

cause them to walk out on us?

From whence came

fertility,

pregnancy, birth?

Why

illness

and death?

Questions about the placation of and the bill-payments to the Providers of Vital Resources fall under the department of
R.e.l.i.g.i.o.n.

The

first

human

tribal cultures to

emerge down south involved

nature worship and were understandably polytheistic. Survival

71

TIMOTHY LEARY
Pantheism was tailored to the conditions. Since the information
each tribe received was Hmited to the neighborhood network,
re-

ligion was hands-on, personal, practical. The Gods (i.e. the Higher Power and Utility Companies) were local, reachable, avail-

able to the individual.

So each

tribe

developed

its

own

mythology.

And

each person

selected the rituals for

making theological
the individual body.

deals.

the

Gods flow through

The powers of Most pagan religious

ceremonies involve the ingestion of sacred plants which produce


altered states of trance, possession, vision, triggering off intense

dialogues with the Supremes. Religious rituals involve the body: drums, chants, dance. Since
the
it

body

is

the only available appliance of survival

and worship,

is

flaunted

and
in

glorified in its
is

naked, centerfold beauty.


naturally elevated because

role of

women

pagan cultures

The Her

body

seen as the producer of Life. Tropical latitudes produce natural attitudes about the gods,
is

man, and law. Nothing was

illegal.

to the Mid-Temperate
There are
logistical

Humanity Migrates North Zone


reasons
stage of
climactic, psycho-geographical,

many obvious why the next


in the

more complex human

cultures

Mid-Temperate emerged frosty Cold Temperature (45th to 60th) or the Tropics. Next time you look at a world map, turn it upside down and notice how most of the land lies north of the equator. Note how most of the inner waterways, the seas and lakes and rivers are
located

(30th to 45th) rather than the

on the

affluent,

nean had been


to
it

in the

busy north-side. Suppose the Mediterramiddle of Africa with the Nile flowing South

and the Congo too and that big Gibraltar mouth opening to

the Atlantic around Angola.

72

Body
Notice

how almost all the


in the

narrow geographic zone: 30th


Life

enduring civilizations emerged in to 45th Streets.

this

Mid-Temperate is more demanding. Your Hunter-Gatherer Credit-Card life won't get you far up here, lad. Natural technologies no longer suffice. There are a few neighbor-

up north

hood

fruit stores

and

local delicatessens north of 30th Street.

You

gotta start whittling and chipping artifacts. Tools. During the years 4000 B.C. to 1500 A.D. the strip between the 30th and

45th degrees became the

frenetic, high-tech genetic

Run your
names of

finger along this inter-state

runway. road-map. Recite the


a big tourist attrac-

the exits. China. India. Persia

(still

tion). Babylonia. Egypt. Rome. Venice. Spain. Portugal. Can you feel the action? Along this thin highway moved the camel caravans, horsedrawn carts, the legions, the sailing ships, the galley cruise-hners,

the iron-age technologies.


All this

movement was made

possible by

new hand-tool

tech-

nologies for transporting people


Literacy
possible.

and for communicating ideas. and the alphabet made long distance communication

Can you visualize how small, tribal gene-pools numbering hundreds and then thousands of souls became absorbed into nations
numbering millions? These centralized feudal empires were held together by collective labor and strict cultural rules.

The

individual

becomes a dependent cog

in a vast hierarchical

social structure. In Ancient

Rome, food, water,

lodging,

and

se-

were not obtained through natural-physical actions. The goodies come from Caesar's utility departments.
curity
Politics
is

no longer a personal confrontation with the family


involves submission to the ruler.

next door.
Religion

It
is

no longer

G.O.D.s (Gods
structions,

On

a personal handshake deal with the local Duty) but a complicated political coda of intablets
priest-

commandments, rewards, recorded on marble

and illuminated manuscripts, mediated by a bureaucratic


73

TIMOTHY LEARY
hood which claimed to be fronting for the Almighty Ruler who allowed no violation of his morals and laws. When the neighborhood 30th to 45th Streets was happening, the individual was vassal, totally dependent and submissive. Tropical folks felt some primitive pride in their personal ability to put food on the table and avoid enemies via their own bodily skills, jungle-smarts and bribery deals with the utility companies. But
the Feudal person did not share this personal sense of
self-

confidence.

The most revealing insights about any human culture or genepool probably come from observing attitudes towards animals, the human body, and the female body in particular.
Polytheistic societies totemically
spirits

worship natural forces. Animal and the naked forms of the attractive healthy human.
religious art

Check the
ple.

framed

in the cave-galleries of

pagan peo-

Feudal

societies,

by grim contrast, are organized around the

monotheistic principle of
Ruler,

One

Elderly

Male God,

the Almighty

theistic

who sits on a Throne swathed in Regal robes. The MonoGod who rules things along the 30th to the 45th is never
town
bare-assed, flaunting his

seen running around

naked beauty

and

grace.

Can you imagine Jehovah on

the cover of Rolling

Stone?

Monotheistic religions tend to derogate the natural, scorn the body, and manifest a "puritanical" hatred for the naked female form. In orthodox Christian, Jewish, and Moslem cultures, woman is covered by black dresses and veils. This is tacky, lowfashion garb, designed to conceal

Her

life-affirming image.
is

But

life

in hierarchical feudal societies

not

all

submission and

puritanical repression.
his camel.

The man can always beat his wife, his kids, But the greatest source of pleasure and pride for True Believers is this: You can always strap on your sword and head

down-town below 30th

Street

and exhibit the superiority of your

74

Body

God and your


icals

gene-pool by kicking innocent, nature-loving trop-

around.

For 10,000 years and more, northern folks have invaded, conquered, and enslaved Southerners. Kill 'em, loot 'em, rape 'em in
the

name

of

count.
itives.

They

God and Country because tropical people don't are heathen, pagan, illiterate, immoral, naked primrejected

They have

The One God and

that's

why we

have

the metal sv^^ords, the v^ritten Bible, the cavalry, the ships.

And

they don't. The invasion and colonization of the south by the north has produced a curious "genetic stratification" or cultural infiltration.

The Northern

colonizers built feudal-age

roads, ports, churches, bridges in their

cities, towns, cities, southern "possessions."

And

they imposed their new-fangled,

artificial,

manmade,

social,

political, religious, cultural,

and

linguistic

forms on the natives.


is

The Spanish conquest and


classic

settlement of South America

example of the "trickle-down-south" phenomenon. The

Feudal system of centralization, monotheism, bureaucratization, hierarchy, and military control based in Madrid, produced a colonial replica of life in 15th-century Spain.

The South American Indians were


miliar serf
fields

gently coaxed into the fa-

mode

of the Iberian peasantry.

and then to church and they knelt

They shuffled to the down and crossed them-

selves just like the vassals did

up

in the 30's Spain.

God and Man Become Machine-Tooled


in

the Cold-Temperate Zone

These aforementioned Feudal Empires which emerged along the Mediterranean basin were based on hand-tools used to tame
horses, channel water, harness wind-power. People

were held

to-

75

TIMOTHY LEARY
gether by an intricate
tions.

web

of laws, rules, taboos, ethical prescrip-

The next
learned

stage in
to

how

human evolution was the industrial. Humans make tool-making machines. The German, Johanit all

nes Gutenberg, started

with his diabolic printing press which

made

possible the

mass production of books

which made pos-

sible mass-literacy,

Get out your


cities

map

mass-education, factory technology. of Europe and run your finger along the next
to 60th latitudes. Notice
lie

step in evolution.

The 45th

how

great
strip.

where the

Industrial

Age emerged

in this

narrow

Milan, France, the Ruhr, Germany, England, Scotland, Scandinavia,

USSR.

Dig the sudden brand switch in the

God

department. The great

feudal religions had been Catholic and Islamic.

The

great religions

of the Industrial Civilizations are Protestant and Communist. Ex-

tremely White

mandment is: The virtuous

an Engineer God whose "Put on your uniform and work!"


citizen, like a

Men worship

ethical

com-

good machine,

is

now

defined as

dependable, prompt, reliable, efficient, productive. There are many reasons climatic, geo-psychological,
cal

logisti-

why

industrial civilization

emerged

in the cold

environment.

was needed to warm houses in the frigid north. And heat requires the manufacture and storage and transmission of Newtonian energies. So
It's all

about heat.

continual, indoor heat-supply

it

was heat

that turned the wheels of the factories. Steam power.


Oil.

Coal power.

Mastery of mechanical

of the 18th to the 20th Centuries.

power produced the industrial empires The factory-made steam vessels

and railroads and weapon-machines made possible dreams of


world conquest.
energy-supplies required for Northern factories were to be found, (guess where!) in the two lower floors: the Mid-Temperate

The

zone,

by Northern theologians "The Third World" and, of course, the Tropics, now called "The Fourth World."
called

now

76

Body
So colonies were established

in the

Middle

East, India, South

East Asia, and Africa. These zones were efficiently looted for

"raw"

materials.

Just as the

Roman and

Arabic and Spanish kingdoms of the

and gold Mid-Temperate and ivory, so did the white-skinned empires steam and jet south to build railroads, airstrips, tourist hotels and to erect the steamsailed to the tropics to find black slaves

belching,

smoky temples of the Mechanical God: factories. Again, the new Northern culture is layered down over the

old

customs. These days the typical tropical country take Haiti or Kenya is stratified like this: a solid foundation of tribal culture, veneered over by a Feudal, Strong-Man military regime, which in

supported by American or European or Soviet mechanical This works well for a while. The North exports guns and might. machines. The guns are used to motivate the tropical folks to dig
turn,
is

the
to

raw

materials out of the ground, which are then shipped north

pay for guns. But on weekends and full-moons and sacred occasions, guess what? The natives tend to revert to nature. They joyously perform
the old rituals: strip off the veils, paint their bodies, drum, dance,

chant, ingest plants that put


ness, get possessed
forces,

them

into altered states of conscious-

engage

in

by God-knows-how-many different natural sexual activities, and just generally party it up

in the classic sense of this sacred

word.

It's

the basic, time-

honored, religious ceremony an invitation to the Gods to inhabit, possess, take over the minds

a celebration, an innovation, and

and bodies of
Believe me,
service.

their worshippers.

no one

is

on

his

knees during a pagan religious

Now
basic

Or if they are, it's not in suppliant, begging prayer. the white Protestants found this extremely shocking.
religions,
veil

The

aim of northern
and
loins of all

we

recall,

was
sin.

to root out, ex-

orcise, censor,

subdue the

which the

bibles say lurk in the

hearts

men. Nature means

The Northern

priests

denounced

the native practices as pagan,

77

TIMOTHY LEARY
heathen, deviUsh,
together in
evil.

God-fearing, decent white folks banded

mechanical unanimity-unity to condemn nudity, sex,

intoxication, possession.
Efficient

Northern mechanical cultures also


Africa, even in Greece

trickle

down

to the

Temperate zones. In East Asia, Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan, Middle


East,

North

and Turkey, the factory-made

guns and communication devices permit the inhabitants to indulge


in the all-time favorite sport of Feudal lands: fanatical, genocidal

religious crusades.

So trouble, bad trouble has been brewing

down

south for

many

centuries: starvation, drought, poverty, over-population, racial

endemic war, increasing terrorism and towards the Northern rulers and cultures. growing anger But now, these scary attitudes no longer seem quarantined

and

religious conflict,

down

there in the untidy southerjj latitudes. They are already bubbling up to confront the industrial nations of the north.

The South Invades the North


with Super-Natural Powers!

The

cultural

and economic

traffic

between the tropic and the tem-

perate zones has always been a two-way street. The north exports artificials: tools, machines, guns, law books,
political constitutions, cultural rules, religious taboos.

The south exports


precious gems, rare
course.

its

natural resources:

raw

materials, ores,

woods, herbs, spices, exotic foods

and

oil,

of

And, most important, human bodies in the form of slaves and migrant workers. Now, guess what these poor, benighted heathen smuggled in with them on the slave ships and immigrant boats? Exactly those
precious
gifts

which the northern cultures had censored and pro-

hibited in their

own

hard-working, god-fearing, inhibited folks.

78

Body
Precisely that for
for.

which the mechanical-robot people hungered

natural!

The Pagan Culture. The pantheist ways. The worship of the The wild celebration of life. The exultant embrace of the

The spontaneous embrace of the sensual. The street-smart wisdom of the outsiders who, for centuries, had been cooly observing and mocking the "pious white folks" marching around with their guns and crosses.
ancient biological powers.

This insidious cultural invasion surfaced in the Roaring 20th Century when intelligent Northerners began to sense the heavy
price they paid for mechanization.

In the 1920s, the

pagan

revival

came above ground

in the

form

of jazz. Musicians no longer followed directors or conductors or


printed scores. Improvisation, syncopation, innovation.

The

jazz

musician gets possessed, trances out. In both the

USA and

the

USSR
The The

the acceptance of jazz becomes the


is

first

sign that the in-

dustrial ethos

loosening up.

definitive explosion of

pagan

cultural

themes happened in
riots.

the 1960s.
Civil Rights

movement. Black

Pride.

The ghetto

More important was


roll.

the music. Never has a cultural-religious

event changed the world as quickly and pervasively as rock and

Why?

Because rock

is

a magical blend of African-polytheistic

rhythms and European-pagan-Celtic-Druid lyrics: amplified and flung around the world at the speed of light by quantumelectronic technology.

And
was

it is

no accident

that the religious message of rock

and and

roll

a joyful rejection of the mechanization that feudal

In-

dustrial cultures glorified.

When Bob Dylan


white
line

sang: "I ain't

gonna work on Maggie's farm


colored, southern,

no more," he expressed

the spirit of everyone

who

rejected the alienation of the smokestack-assembly-

Factory culture.

79

TIMOTHY LEARY
The popularity of psychedelic drugs
revival of southern culture.
is

another example of the


illegal in

Notice that the neurotransmitters made


are southern vegetables: the poppy,

Reagan's land, cocoa leaves, the ground up

flowering tops of the marijuana plant. None of these botanical substances are as physically or psychologically dangerous as the

factory-made,

northern mind-benders:

distilled

liquor.

North

Carolina-grow^n nicotine and the prescription euphoriants and


tranks used legally by middle-class housew^ives.

The southern botanicals grass, opium, coca are threatening to the order and conformity demanded by the Factory Culture:
1.

Like the natives w^ho use them, these vegetables grow^ wild. They are non-domesticated. Grown up in mountains, they are

hard to control. They are sold on the black market, that

naughty unauthorized, free exchange that operates outside the control of the white bankers and the feudal tax collectors.
Inexpensive, wild, southern herbs compete with the lucrative slave

and rum trades which our Puritan founders had

going.

2.

Native drug rituals are immoral, i.e. banned as sinful by the northern religions. Damn right they are! They incite personal
freedom, pagan celebration, self-expression, disordered joy,
sensual pleasure.
priests.

They dramatically threaten control of the


those scandalous biblical stories about

Remember

Moses and

the other high-ranking priests

coming down the

mountain and finding the tribes stoned, whooping it up around the Golden Calf and other natural icons? Heresy. Sin.
Devil Worship.

3.

The

ingestion of native plants

is

also criminal.

Why?

Because

the white

men who

write the laws and run the police stations

say so!

80

Body

4.

The and

ingestion of natural plants

is

not only immoral, criminal,


It

bad-for-business,

it

is

treasonous.

figures, doesn't it?

You

are a self-respecting native

and

in

come

these weirdo

white robots brandishing guns, despoiling your neighborhood, your culture, breaking up your family, scorning your
gods.

Now
is

the

most

effective, non-violent act of political re-

sistance
tive

to perform your native rituals, get high with a nafriends have gently

opium pipe and you and your


and
political

and
reli-

delightfully floated outside the white

man's economic,

gious, legal,

domination.

For centuries, the northern colonists ignored and tolerated the


cultivation

and ingestion of neuro-botanicals

as long as

it

was

restricted to the native quarters. Let the illiterate

wogs

get their

primitive kicks.

Keep 'em

blissed

and nodding

out.

new postwar generations of white folks from the Cold War and life on the assembly began turning away line. The cultural revolution in America produced a vigorous reBut
in the 1960s, the

naissance of the source religions of the south. Pantheist love of nature was expressed as was Ecological awareness. Worship of
bodily grace manifested in physical fitness. High pagan style came hip-high fashion. The acculturalization of psychedelic drugs by Americans in
be-

the

1960s provides a powerful endorsement of tropical religious rituals. The psychedelic drugs are all derived from tropical plants.

mushrooms, mescaline from peyote, LSD from of course, marijuana. These are not the euphorand, rye-ergot, or ants, energizers, or intoxicants favored by urban dwellers.
Psilocybin from Psychedelics produce states of possession, trance, expanded consciousness, spiritual illumination, powerful, mystical empathies with natural forces. These experiences, which are the aim of ancient pagan religions, are the worst nightmares of the organized
religions.

The

so-called "drug culture"

was not

campus

fad;

it

was a

81

TIMOTHY LEARY
world-wide revival of the oldest religions going. The hippies intuitively sensed this as they proudly wandered around barefoot,
playing
flutes.

Paganism 101 suddenly became the most popular

campus

elective.

Psychiatrists

and law enforcement

officials

and

politicians au-

tomatically

assumed that psychedelic experiences were selfinduced bouts of mass insanity. There were no terms or paradigms
Western
intellectual tradition to explain this bizarre desire

in the

to "go out of your mind."


It is

of great sociological interest that the so-called "drug cul-

ture" in America and

West Europe (and now, we

learn, in the

Soviet bloc) dutifully re-enacted the rituals of pre-Christian pa-

gans and polytheists. In the 1960-70s, millions living in industrial nations used psychedelics in the context of Hindu and Buddhist
practices.

Psychedelic drugs were taken in groups and in public celebrations.

The

acid tests of
in the

Ken

Kesey.

The

love-ins.

The communes.

Today,

Rambo
of

'80s, drugs are tooted, shot, freebased,

cracked in secrecy. Usually alone.

group support expressed in pagancannot be over-estimated. The psychepsychedelic experiences delic culture profoundly flaunted drug-taking because it was
importance

The

The

designed to produce nature-loving, tribe-solidarity experiences. first San Francisco Be-In was advertised as "A Gathering of

the Tribes!"

This happened at Grateful

Dead

concerts

when 20,000 "dead-

heads" mingled together in dancing celebration.


Drug-taking becomes drug-abuse when practiced in narcissistic solitude. In 1988, 30 miUion Americans use illegal drugs safely

and 50 million use booze moderately. Why.^ Because they indulge during group rituals which protect against abuse. Beer-busts.
Cocktail parties. Smoking grass with friends. It is important to note that the only elective rehabilitation pro-

gram

for alcohol

and drug abusers


82

is

A.A.

Body

The

stated aims

and

tactic of

A.A. are pagan-spiritual. Surren-

der to a higher power in an intense support-group setting. No churches. No government officials. No salaries. No funding. Just
village-type

group support.

gift that Southerners gave to the North was a "resurrection of the body." The factory civilization covered skin by uniforms. The role models of the mechanical society were se-

Perhaps the greatest

rious,

frowning

men

in business suits,

walking heavily, ponder-

ously to their very important office jobs.

No man

of substance in
grace,

Washington, D.C. or
flashy style.

Moscow

or

London betrayed humor,

Watch
stubby
movies.

newsreels of white athletes in the 1930s and 1940s:

little

guys with pot-bellies

stiffly

running around with


in the

jerky movements. Watch the white folks dancing

old

When
the

the Southerners were allowed

on the playing

fields

and

TV

screens, everything changed. Latin rhythms. Afro-cubano

voodoo beats. Caribbean spontaneity on the base-paths. Black grace and elegance on the basketball courts. This was good. Just plain healing and good for the brittle, mechanical white soul.

The Southerners
bought into factory
robots or engineers.

also prepared the mechanical north for the


it:

post-industrial age. Let's face


society.

Blacks and Latinos never really


just don't

The Southerners

make good

But during the 1960s, the Southern rituals and styles suddenly took over the younger generation. The walk, talk, dress, and attitude loosened white kids up.

As Blacks attained fame and wealth

in the performance-creative fields, they refused to act like slave-

workers. They demanded to be paid what they were worth as individuals. Wilt Chamberlain is the guy who changed the eco-

nomic role-model. He was the best. And he expected, logically, to be treated like the best. White athletes had been treated like
mill workers,

bought and sold

like

indentured servants. Cheap

83

TIMOTHY LEARY
Coach
tickets.

Rooms

in sleazy hotels.

Wih demanded

first class.

And
It

hotel

was

the Black athletes

rooms with beds large enough to fit his grandeur. and performers who came up with the

new economic

role-model for the 21st century. In the postindustrial society, if you're good, then you're not a slave or a serf
or a worker. You're a performer!

free agent!

war between North and South is not over. It can be seen in the War on Southern Plants which allows armed American policemen to roam around Central and South America, burning crops and harassing peasants. Here at home, The
civil

War provided distractions for politicians like George Bush, who enjoy being photographed with Dan Rather down in the
the

ghetto or barrio, busting into the houses of the poor folks. As Blacks and Latins exert more power in politics, the old-boy,

white angers are revealed. In fun-loving, gun-loving Montana,


cal rifle clubs issue

lo-

bumper

stickers saying,

"Run

Jesse,

Run."

With

the silent complicity of the


just in

emerges not

Reagan administration, racism the Rehnquist court, but in college campuses

and polling-booths. At the same time, the Southern migrants grow stronger in numbers and power. Soon, very soon, whites will be a minority in
most American
cities.

The old Confederate slogan comes back again to haunt oted sons of Dixie. The South will truly rise again.

the big-

84

The Long Search


for the Male

Sex

Elixir

want a new drug, one


that won't
that

that won't

make me

sick

One One

make me

nervous, wonderin'

what

to

do

makes me

feel like I feel

when I'm with you. " "I Want a New Drug,

Huey Lewis and

the

News

AT

A VERY EARLY AGE, AFTER COMPARING THE RATHER Rou-

tine existence of

my

family with the heroic adventures


life

read

about

in books,

concluded that the well-lived

would

neces-

sarily involve quests.

Holy

Grail adventures for fabled goals to

save the

human

race.

During these younger years, I dreamed of becoming a warrior, an explorer, a great scientist, a wise sage. During adolescence a new noble challenge emerged.
It

was

sex.
I

ran into an annoying paradox. Although sex was obviously important to a happy life, I did not have perfect control over my erections. Apparently, many other males shared this same
here
inefficiency.

And

use

The first problem was that the erections came when I couldn't them producing the terrible embarrassment of the unexpected
85

TIMOTHY LEARY
arousal in social situations and the inability to get up and walk across the room because of that mind-of-its-own acting up down
there.

Later

came

the nervousness of

ment of
panties.

foreplay.

"making out." The wild exciteThe unbuttoning of the bra. The removal of the
into position in the backseat of the car.
seat?

The wiggling
believe a

Would you

rumble

The

zipper.

of the contraceptive. The heavy breathing. hear someone coming? The maneuvering for penetration.

The arrangement The anxieties. Do you

Whew!

What happened

to

my

unit?

This interaction between the busy mind and the willful body

suddenly became a most


there were

critical issue.

And

in puritanical

1936

no manuals on the care and use of this complex equip-

ment.
consulted the dictionary and discovered that something called an aphrodisiac increased sexual performance. I rushed to the library and consulted every encyclopedia available. Not a mention
I

of aphrodisiac.

How curious
Oh
adult
well.
life.

that such an important topic

was

totally ignored.

Here was another unexplained, mysterious

facet of

Lindbergh could fly the Atlantic. We could put a man on the South Pole. But we couldn't get control of the most important part of our body. I guessed that. After I graduated from college, I decided to be a psychologist. This seemed to be the key profession. If you could understand

your

own mind and

not be victimized by emotions, you could


life.

then master the other issues of

Sex was no problem.


domesticated.
ule just as
I

My

was happily married and productively erections reported to duty promptly on schedI

did at the office.

86

Body

The Quest
In 1960,
I

for the Magic Potion

Goes to Harvard

moved

to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to join the Har-

vard faculty.

My

sexual situation

was changed.
thrills

was

a 40-year-

old single person facing, once again, the spills of the mating ground.

of romance and

At
very

this

point

found that

my

sexuality
felt

(how

shall

put

it?)

was

elitist

and

selective. I

no longer

the incessant, throbbing

teenage desire to fuck any consenting warm body in the vicinity. A one-night stand could be a lust or a bust depending on my
feelings

toward the woman,

my

emotional

state,

and

my

period

of heat.

To

find out

more about

these matters,

read extensively on the

subject and talked to

my

friends in the psychiatric, clinical,


I

and

personality departments.

learned that male sexuality

is

not an

automatic macho scene. The male erotic response turned out to be a most complex situation. More than two-thirds of the male
population over the age of 35 reported less than perfect control over their desires. Adult males seemed to have cycles and rhythms

and

all

sorts of delicate sensitivities that are usually attributed to

the "weaker sex."


Scientific observers

totally virility

were

either lying or

agreed that most of the guys who claimed were too primitive and callous

to appreciate the exquisite complications of erotic interaction in

the fast-moving, ever-changing Post-Industrial civilization.

Or

something like that. So here was an interesting social phenomenon. It was generally believed by psychologists back there in 1960 that much of the
conflict, aggression, paranoia,

and sadism that was plaguing

so-

ciety
line

was due

to sexual frustration.

Sigmund Freud
it

started this

of thought. Wilhelm Reich carried conclusion.

to

its

logical, political

Sex means cheerfully giving up control to receive pleasure. The


less

sex the

more

control. Take, for example, a control-freak like

87

TIMOTHY LEARY
Edgar Hoover. Here was a 70-year-old prude who got his FBI kicks from collecting sexual dossiers on rival politicians. Take,
for example, Richard

J.

Nixon, a

man no one ever accused of having


I

tender erotic feelings.


It
if

was

at this time, in the spring of 196J0, that

concluded that

a safe, dependable aphrodisiac

chological and social

were available, many of the psyproblems facing our species would instantly

be improved. So I descended on the Harvard Medical School Library with a team of graduate assistants. We scoured the bibUographies and
journal
files

for data

about aphrodisiacs.
literature

There was an enormous amount of


the subject.

on the

history of

Mandrake root was apparently


mentioned
avelli

the

first

sex stimulus;
it;

it

was

twice in the Bible.

Pythagoras bragged on

Machi-

wrote a comedy about


flesh

it.

and organs of horny animals have been used as an aphrodisiac in almost every time and place. Hippomanes, flesh from the forehead of a colt, was mentioned in Virgil. Medieval

The

Europeans regularly used the penis of the stag, buU, ox, and goat. Ambergris, a jelly from the innards of the whale, was used by
the royal mistress

James Boswell.
Shellfish

Madame du Barry and the insatiably curious Musk was a perennial favorite of erotic searchers.

mussels. In Japan the fugu

have been popular, of course, especially oysters and fish, a form of puffer, is still used by

hopeful lovers. Even today more than 3,000 Japanese die each year while on this dangerous quest.

AU

texts agreed that cantharides, Spanish

fly, is

"most

cele-

brated and terrible aphrodisiac." itching and irritation to the genitals.


the sexually ambitious.

An

overdose causes unbearable

Over the centuries the plant kingdom has been ransacked by

Many

believe that satyrrian, a mythic herb


else

mentioned by the Greeks and Romans, was nothing good old marijuana and hashish.
88

than

Body
mushrooms, and the South American yage. The South The royal jelly and pollen from
plant.

Truffles,

Seas root kava kava. Damiana.


bees.

The cocoa

Peruvian ceramics portrayed pornographic scenes on pots used to prepare nose-candy of the Andes. Is cocaine an aphrodisiac?
"First you're hot,

and then you're not," reported most

sophisti-

cated researchers.

Casanova attributed his record-making lust to raw eggs. The strong, hard, up- jutting horn of the rhino has caught

the

imagination of erection-seekers for centuries. You grind it up into a pov^der and eat it or toot it. In the Orient today, rhino dust
goes for $2,000 a pound. In Hong Kong restaurants they'll sprinkle some rhino-horn powder on your dinner for a hefty addition
to your
bill.

My

research at the Harvard Medical School Library thus dem-

onstrated that

my

quest

was not

a lonely one.

Throughout the

ages, intelligent, affluent, ambitious,

just plain horny human have the Alchemical the true Grail beings continually sought

and

aphrodisiac.

So what does modern science have to contribute to


search?

this

noble

Nothing. Nada. Zilch.

Not only was


ical literature,

no proven aphrodisiac in the current medthere was apparently no research being done on
there

this

most important topic. curious. Here was a medicine that could cure many of our medical and psychological problems, and there seemed to be

How

a veil of secrecy around the subject.

When
plained

tried to talk to

my

friends

on the medical

faculty about

this subject, they


it

clammed

up. Finally, an endocrinologist pal exis

to me. "Listen, Timothy, the subject of aphrodisiacs

taboo. If any medical scientist or physiologist here, or in the Soviet Union, were to apply for a grant to research this field, his
reputation

would be

ruined.

He'd be considered a
89

flake."

TIMOTHY LEARY
"But
it's

a great research topic,"

protested.

"The

first scientist

who

discovers an effective aphrodisiac will be a savior of mankind

and make a bundle of money." "No question about it," said the endocrinologist. "We all know that if a crack team of psychopharmacologists were to research
this topic, they

could come up with an aphrodisiac in a year.


will

It

will

happen. Someday someone


President. There's

win the Nobel


is

Prize

and

make

a billion dollars marketing one. But this


is

only 1960. Ei-

an overpopulation problem. The culture isn't ready for a medicine that would have the male population running around with erect dicks bulging out of their pants.

senhower

Jeez, we're just

coming up with a polio


we'll

vaccine.

Come back

in

20

years,

and maybe
pill

There was no doubt about


the idea of a
that

have an erection injection." it. There was a social taboo against


give a

would

man

a calm, certain, control

over his precious equipment. I couldn't understand it. If your car decided to run when it wanted to, you'd have it adjusted right

was temperamental and turned off at its own whim, you'd take steps to put you back in charge. This resistance to self-improvement became really obvious when I was taken to see a sex show in the Reeperbahn of Hamburg, West Germany. I was with a very sophisticated editor of the news magazine Der Spiegel and a well-known psychiatrist. The show amazed me. Straight-out fucking onstage! I was most
away.
If

your

TV

set

impressed by a big Swedish youth who bounded around the set with this enormous hard-on, fucking first this fiery redhead who wrapped her legs around him, and then a sultry brunette who lay

on a couch holding her arms up

invitingly,

and then pleasuring a

saucy blonde who bent over, leaning her head against the wall with her backsides wiggling.

For 20 minutes,
total self-mastery

this acrobatic

in front of

young man pranced around with an audience of 200! We're talking

Olympic Gold Medal time!

90

Body
is impressive," I said to my German hosts. scoffed in that scornful, jaded Hamburg style. "That's not the real thing," said the editor. "He's taken some

"That guy's stamina

They

drug."

The
I

psychiatrist agreed,

waving

his
I

hand

in dismissal.
it

leaped to

my

feet.

"What drug?"

shouted. "What's

called?

Where can you

get it?"

No

answer from

my German

friends.

They

just couldn't

admit

to being interested.

The Aphrodisiacal
In August, 1960, by a

Effect of Psychedelic

Drugs

swimming pool in Mexico, I took magic mushrooms and discovered the power of psychedelic drugs to reprogram the
I

brain.

rushed back to Harvard and started the Psychedelic Drug Research Project. Novelist Aldous Huxley was our adviser. We as-

sembled 30 of the brightest young researchers in the area. We were on to something that could change human nature. We felt like Oppenheimer after his Almagordo bomb. Except better because psychedelic drugs allow you to release the nuclear energies inside your head.

two years the Harvard Psychedelic Drug Research studied the reactions of 1,000 subjects to LSD. Project discovered that the key to a psychedelic-drug session is set
In the next

We

and

setting. Set is

your mind

fix.

Your psychological

state.

Be very

Aldous Huxley: English novelist and essayist Huxley's The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell made him the world's most influential writer

on the psychedelic experience and a grandfatherly presence during the explosive psychedelic era.

91

TIMOTHY LEARY
careful

what you want from a

session, because you're likely to

get

it.

is the environment. If your surroundings are scary, then be scared. If you'll your surroundings are beautiful, then you will have a beautiful experience.

Setting

Our

sessions at

Harvard were designed

for self-discovery.

The

sessions

were held
sex.

in groups, so neither the set

nor the setting

emphasized

My
holy
set

colleague Richard Alpert,

who

later

became the famous


if

man Baba Ram

Dass, was hipper.

He

discovered that

the

and expectation were erotic and the setting was his bedroom, then psychedelic drugs were powerfully aphrodisiacal. I give Ram
Dass a
I

lot of credit for this

breakthrough.
to

remember the day he came


is

me and

said, "All this inner

true, you can access any circuit in great. your brain and change your mind. But it's time you faced the

exploration stuff

It's

facts,

Timothy.

We are turning on the most powerful sexual organ

in the universe: the brain!"

the secret.

Other sophisticated people came to Harvard and tipped us to The philosopher Gerald Heard. The beatnik poet Allen

Ginsberg. The Buddhist sage Alan Watts. The Western folk hero Neil Cassady. We were just rediscovering what philosophers and poets and mystics and musicians and hedonists had known for

Allen Ginsberg:

One of the most influential poets of the 20th century, Ginsberg was also a Buddhist and serious seeker of altered states of consciousness and a major friend and ally to Leary.

Alan Watts: Anglican priest and English author of The Spirit of Zen and Psychotherapy East and West, Watts was the premier lecturer on Buddhism

and Eastern mysticism for Western audiences. Neil Cassady: The hero of Jack Kerouac's On the Road, Cassady was known as the Johnny Appleseed of Dope for his brave forays into mind-changing
states.

92

Body
centuries. Marijuana, hashish,

mushrooms, and LSD provided

else, I multiplied my sensory pleasure, learning the techniques or erotic engineering. Everything became a source of aesthetic-erotic pleasure. The effect

powerful sensory experiences. For the next 20 years, Hke everyone

was

in the head. If
life

you knew how

to tune your brain,

you could

enrich your sex

beyond your wildest dreams.


that matter of controlling the rod of flesh.
in

But there was

still

We

could

move around

our brains. Good! But

why

couldn't a

man

operate his penis at will, the

way

he moves the voluntary

organs of his body.

A
One

Risky Encounter with Medical Science


1

night in 1983,

was having dinner with

a friend

who worked

at UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute. During the evening he mentioned that a breakthrough in the erection department was at hand. He said that a Stanford University research team was de-

veloping a
tions!

pill that would give immediate control of your erecThe active ingredient was called yohimbine. This was a discovery of historic importance! It could mean the

end of male

insecurity, cruelty,

and war! This could break the


television!

wretched addiction to prime-time

friend also said that a local group. The Southern California Sexual Function Center, was giving these new pills to research subjects. I phoned and made an appointment with the director. If

My

the

pill

existed,

wanted to

try

it

out and help

make

it

available

to the public.

The

clinic is

next door to the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

There was a large waiting room. About eight very old

men were

slumped over, staring glumly crutches. Some were drooling.


sitting

at the carpet.

couple had

93

TIMOTHY LEARY
The nurse greeted me
I

cordially

and asked me to

fill

out a form.

said,

"I'm here to discuss research on aphrodisiacs with the doc-

tor." She smiled compassionately

and said she understood, but


I

would

please

fill

out the forms. So

did.

After a while, a male technician, about 40, with the graceful

charm of a

hairdresser, asked
I

me

to

come

to a backroom.

ex-

plained that

wanted

to discuss research with the doctor.

He
this

smiled understandingly and asked


point
this

me

to take

some

tests.

At

I was about to say "Forget it," but it occurred to me that would be a great opportunity to see what happens in these

frontiers of medical science.

And
I

realized that the doctor wasn't


tests.

going to give

me
the

pills until

had taken the

So

took the

standard blood and urine

tests.

Then came
plained that

mad

scientist stuff.
if

we had

to find out
unit.

there

The technician patiently exwas a strong and steady


tip

flow of blood to
base of
sat

my

So he wired the

of

my

cock, the

my

cock, and an artery in

my

leg to an amplifier,

and we

back to Usten. Boom-boom-boom.


the

My

genital bloodstream

filled

room with

its

strong pulse. Sounded like the rhythm

section of a heavy-metal rock group to me.

noise really took off.

still wired for sound. The Boom-da-boom\ I kept explaining that I had regular, if unpredictable erections. just wanted the pill! The technician was very understanding.
it

The technician nodded in approval. Next he had me jog in place, my unit

"Tell

to the doctor," he said.


cordial. He evaded my questions about He explained how complicated this field was. The

The doctor was very


the aphrodisiac.

mind, the brain, the hormones, the circulatory system, phobias,

and drug abuse, fatigue, overwork, marital discord, early traumas, fetishes, anxieties, and menopausal life stages all play an important part.
repressions, venereal diseases, alcohol

94

Body
At

this point

to deal

dawned on me that this cUnic supposedly set up with sexual arousal was the most antiseptic, mechanical,
it
I

unerotic place

had
If I

seen.

could

feel

my reservoir of sexual desire

draining away.

didn't have an erection

very likely to get one here. a vow of chastity.


I

problem before, I was This place could make Casanova take

felt like

the ambitious starlet

who was promoted from


in a
I

the
jun-

casting couch to a disease-ridden


gle.

movie location

Congo

Who

do

have to fuck to get out of


relentless.

this place?

thought to

myself.

The doctor was


frequency
test.

He

insisted that

take the erection

You took the

gadget home and wired up your cock

during your sleep to measure the amount and strength of nocturnal hard-ons. I explained that I had them all the time. "Listen,
just

phone my wife. She takes readings every night." The male nurse outfitted me with the peter-meter, stored

for

travel in a large suitcase. All the old

men

in the waiting

room
it

looked up sadly as

bounced by with the

case.

My wife We rushed

was

intrigued. She couldn't wait for

me

to try

on.

to the

Velcro straps,

bedroom and set it up by the side of the bed. wires hooked to dials, clocks, and meters. It was
I

so science fiction sexy that

got an erection.

My wife

applauded.

"That gadget is wonderful!" she marveled. "Hey, look out," I shouted. "You'll ruin the experiment."
"Fabulous," murmured
I

my

wife.
is

"Hey," worried, "everything we're doing "Three cheers for science," she said.
Well,

being recorded!"

we broke

the machine. Wires pulled

off.

cable appar-

ently short-circuited.

stopped. All the


rest.

The clock motor heaved a buzzing sigh and meters went over, flickered and came to a satiated
said.
I

"Fabulous,"

Next Monday
I

returned the destroyed gadget.

I felt

very guilty.

tried to explain

what had happened


95

to the technician.

He

gave

TIMOTHY LEARY
me
a stern look.

When

asked about the aphrodisiac

pill,

he

made

an appointment for me to see the doctor. That weekend my wife and I took some mushrooms and had a
wonderful time.
doctor.

On Monday I reported
still

for

my interview with the


I

The old men were

in the waiting

room.

went

to see the

male nurse and told him about the great sex party over the weekend. He looked at me coldly.
I

told the doctor about the wonderful effects of the psychedelic.

He seemed unimpressed. I asked him for the aphrodisiac pill once again. He denied such a potion existed. His position was clear. If
you didn't have a circulatory problem that could be treated by normal medicine, your penile control and enhancement program

was

to be handled by a shrink.

Or your

rabbi, priest, or minister.

A
It

Thrilling

Breakthrough

in

Medical Science!

was August 1984 when the news we'd been waiting for hit the news wires. Physiologists at Stanford University announced that they had developed a potent aphrodisiac. The potion was extracted from the bark of the African yohimbine tree. Tests on laboratory rats proved "sensational." It seemed that
the rodents doubled their sexual activity.

announced that they were ready to begin testing the drug on humans. The news flash stirred up the predictable
researchers
enthusiastic response.

The

Medical Center

News

spokesperson at the Stanford University Bureau reported that the item had "been

accorded a good deal more space and time than most of the bureau's reports on medical progress."

The expected puritan


Daniel
S.

reaction

was not long

in

coming.

One

Greenberg, publisher of Science and Government Report, complained that "in terms of science's traditional quest for fundamental understanding, yohimbine research is pretty thin

96

Body
Mr. Greenberg asserted that this interest and self-indulgence

Stuff."

in happiness

was
to a

a sign of passion, vanity,

as

opposed

space shot to study the surface of Mars.

Mr. Greenberg's essay was widely reprinted

even in the staid


to ridicule the

Los Angeles Times. The purpose of the piece was research and discourage its continuation.
So here

we are again. Ronald Reagan makes speeches denouncand promising to raise the swollen, turgid national hedonism ing debt. If I were running for President, I'd promise the American
people a crash program in the production of a
inexpensive aphrodisiac.
assure them.
If

safe, effective,

thumpers and the anti-sex


"Don't worry,
use aphrodisiac

Moral Majority and the biblepeople protested, I would quickly rethe


If

my
I

fellow Americans.

elected President,
I'll

I'll

power

to protect national security.

neutralize

our warlike enemies.

will ask the Air Force to parachute a billion

doses into the Soviet Union."

As we used

to sing in the

good old

days: "Give peace a chance."

97

Hedonic Psychology

The
'he

Basic

Rhythm

only and
rhythm

basic
of:

pattern in the universe

is

the

oscil-

lating

EXPANSION

Body
At a certain point
energy slov^s
in the galactic dance, the

outward movement

begins to curve back. Expansion ahernates to contraction. Free

down and

is

caught in structure. Expansion ahers

to contraction.

The great stellar spiral whirls back to center. Look upwards on starry summer night to the constellation Sagand you
to
will notice diffuse white clouds of stars. This
is

ittarius

the center of the galaxy.

The Headquarters from which

it

has

all

come and

which

it

will all return.


If

You

are looking

home

to

you are very silent and tuned to you may hear the hushed song which accompanies the cosmic dance. You may hear Her whisper from the nuclear
the nuclear, seed beginning.
fine sensitivity

past-present-center,

"Come back

to me."

The choreography of the


est units of energy.

is repeated in the smallwhirl around the nucleus of Charged particles

galactic

whole

the atom.
in

And

each atom spins, sometimes

free,

sometimes locked

rhythmic structure.

Now

out.

Now

in.

Open

up. Close

Down.

Exhale. Inhale.

The

adventurous outer spins around the nuclear inner. And both orbit around larger magnetic centers, thus creating a double spiral. The

double

helix.

2.

Which Brings Us
is

to Life

In the center of every living cell

the

DNA helix: densely-packed


this

energy information.

And outward bound from

compressed
ex-

center are strands of molecules weaving the cellular fabric

changing, expanding, hooking into the organic network surrounding.

DNA
driac

structure within. Without:

RNA

adventure, mitochon-

movement, membrane contact, permeable opening up, blossoming, erotic merging. The tight center and the expansive trip.

99

TIMOTHY LEARY
3.

...

Which

in

Turn Ennbodies

The

cellular trip

is

through the body. The portions remain astrothe

nomical.

The mammalian body,


Trillions
all

human

body, are incompre-

hensibly galactic.

of cells center

around structured
transactions,

organs,

interconnected,

humming with market

weather reports, pollution ratings, stellate arterials. Watery canals are jammed with plasma planets, hematological Messierian clusters, white corpuscle comets, endocrine spaceships commuting.

The whole monstrous galaxy


of living forms,
all in

leaps through terrestrial networks communication. An eighteen-inch layer of

slime covers a metal-rock planet and every organism around the

25,000 mile expanse, breathing life film in close connection with the one-whole. The biological web. Two young hot stars brush by each other
in a Southeast

Asian port town and days

later a

new

fertile

up housekeeping High School girl in Kansas. The body breathes to the old basic rhythm. Open. Close. In and Out. Contract. Release. Speed up. Slow down. Get free. Get
vaginal valleys of a
trip

strain of spirochete sets

in the soft, moist,

hooked. Take the

out from the pituitary nucleus. Circulate


the farthest skin lim-

out from the cardiac


its.

home chambers. Reach

Come on

back. Energy moves. Structure captures.

around
jor

floating somatic constellations. Cycling.

Around and Circling. The maby astro-

structures

have

been

identified

for

millennia

biologists, philosopher-priests, healers, observers of the fleshly

heavens.

Are there seven, or twelve or forty-nine or 144 majestic organ


systems in the body zodiac? Respiration. Circulation. And the genitals are governed by the sign of Scorpio, a water sign ruled

by the planet Mars.

100

Body
4.

...

Common

Senses

While the body galaxy centers on the densely packed DNA strand, every organ constellation within the body Zodiac orbits around
the brain, the somatic energy center. Every one of the trillion body cells and every organ constellation is infiltrated by the web of nerve fibres creating neurological
bio-electric
late

Van

Allen belts around each solar

cell,

each constel-

organ system.

The Brain. Galactic headquarters of the fleshly corporation. The Nervous system fills corporeal space with flashing electric messages. Out and back. Off and On. Synaptic conversations. Cunning amino acid architects snuggly protect miniaturized General Motor Plant Engineering cell chambers designing more and more complex Fisher bodies. This year's standard equipment a 13 billion cell brain hooked up to stereophonic audition receivers, bifocal,

self-modulating, auto-tuning retinal video cameras,


kinesthetic

cell-battery-powered

magic-eye

shock

adjusters,

gustatory liquid

analyzers, and

lingual pollution detectors, self-

regulatory nasal gas traps for analysis

and evaluation of

aerial

chemical content.
Cerebral headquarters are ringed by a sensory
billion-celled stations for receiving

DEW

line

of

and transmitting energies from

within and without the somatic galaxy.

Common

sense organs. Eyes. Odor. Taste. Light waves. Night

waves. Finger Tip touch couch. Gyro-stabilize. Balance, Temperature detectors. Posture and Movement. Light waves. Sound

waves.

Each sense organ operates on the same rhythm. up and receive. Close down to transmit. Alternate

On

Off.

Open

current.
in naive

The blinking young pupil expands, delights dilated wonder and then is taught to contract and focus down.

101

TIMOTHY LEARY
Open! Free sensual reception. Free flow. Eros.

Close!

Narrowing of

attention.

No
if

playful fiddling

around to
Use
it

just

enjoy stereo-audiotion.
social good. You'll be

Turn

off those bird calls.

for the
if

punished

you

don't.

(And

SORE

you

do.)

5.

...

Still

to the

Nervous System Which Pulses, Same On-Off Rhythm,


. .

Sometimes Open, Sometimes Contracted by Social Conditioning


The
basic

rhythm of expansion-contraction, Off-On, manifests


myriad format of
repression

it-

self in the

human

encounter, in the unavoidable,

ever-present, polar confrontations between control

and freedom,
the
socially-

between

and

hedonism,

between

conditioned Duty principle and the unconditioned Pleasure Principle.

This ancient beat


ciology, and

is

the only subject matter of psychology, so-

history.

It

expresses

itself

within the personality as

psychic conflict, between

human

beings as interpersonal relations,

and among

social

groups as

politics. It is called

many names:

Social control
Civilization

versus
versus versus versus

individual freedom.

Off. Off.
Off.

On.

barbarism.

On.
On. On. On. On. On. On.

Conditioned reaction

unconditioned pro-action.
play.
sinful acting-out.

Duty
Virtuous Restraint

Off. Off.
natural.

versus
versus versus versus

Reward-pain
Responsibility

doing what comes


non-responsibility.
feeling good.

Off.
Off.

Doing well

Off.

102

Body

Christian

TIMOTHY LEARY
tence" as "eternal" and therefore believes that the pleasure
principle
tic.
is

and the

reality principle are "eternally" antagonisis

The notion

that a non-repressive civilization

impossible

a cornerstone of Freudian theory.

Herbert Marcuse

Herbert Marcuse: This German born philosopher applied Freudian analysis of unconscious repressions to Marx's social views. His classic One Dimensional
rial

Man condemns
over

industrial society

desires

more fundamental

needs.
elite,

which provokes unnecessary mateMarcuse saw the student


ready for revolution.

generation of the '60s as an alienated

104

Pornography

First Official

Act as President

HE MOTTO OF OUR POLITICAL PARTY


Let Live."

IS

"FORGIVE, LiVE,

AND

When I am

elevated to the Highest Office

my

first official

act will

be to issue a Presidential pardon for Everyone.

As a

start

I'll

young

friends

pardon myself, my w^ife, my own kids, and my (all 50 million of them) for any and all offenses
J.

against the flawed order of

Edgar Hoover. And next

I'll

pardon

every government official who has offended the Law of God and the Order of Nature. And then I'll ask the forgiveness of every

human

being, plant,

and animal

species in the

world whose eco-

logical safety has

been threatened by the American Mechanical

Monster.

And

if

there

is

anyone around

who

hasn't gotten into

ble with the

Johnson-Nixon administration, well, and so and I'll even pardon him for that. up say

some troulet him stand

107

The Persecution
1984

of Larry Flynt

UPON A

TIME, THERE

WAS A NATION CONCEIVED

IN LIB-

ONCE erty

and dedicated to the proposition that

women and men

were endowed by birth with the inaUenable right to hve and grow without interference from kings or dictators or popes or ayatollahs or secret

pohce or busybody bureaucrats.

Amazingly enough, this Utopian dream of hberty worked! The lucky land waxed strong and prosperous from sea to shining sea because the people insisted on thinking for themselves. And people who think for themselves work harder and invent new
things to

make

life

more

enjoyable.

In time this nation of freedom


for the entire planet.

became a shining

light of

hope

The word spread. Here was a land in which everyone had an equal shot. No matter where you started from, you were encouraged to get out there and shuffle and hustle and bop along the road of your personal dream to the rock *n' roll beat of your own
rhythm
section.

There were three


ful country.

common

sense rules that guided this wonder-

EDITOR'S NOTE: The


issue of Hustler.

following essay originally ran in the January 1984

108

Pornography

1.

The

first

favorites.

was Fair Play. In the eyes of the law there were no The government was supposed to be the umpire referee

staying out of the way, not taking sides to favor one or the other, making sure that the game was played fair and square. Everyone,

no matter how kooky or


piece,

different,

was allowed

to say his or her

without censorship. You couldn't put a player in the penbox just because they were scoring points against your side alty

or saying things you didn't agree with. This set of rules was called the Bill of Rights.

2.

The second common-sense rule had to do with Religious Freedom. The founders of the country understood that the cause of
conflict

most

civil discord in the past had been rekooks who believed that their God was the One and Only God and that everyone who didn't fall down and worship their particular God was evil and was going to hell and prob-

and war and

ligious fanatics,

ably should right

away

to help God's work.

Religious fervor unfailingly causes folks to lose their sense of

humor. Just
Christian,

try using a

little

gentle satire

around a Fundamentalist
Adventist.
If

Muslim, Jew
is

or Seventh

Day

Religion

a license for people to go weird.

you crack a joke


doesn't, then the

about some Bible-thumper's God, he

really expects that his Big


if

Guy

in the

Sky

will strike

you dead. And

God

Bible-thumper will gladly volunteer for the Holy Hit. How come all these big-shot-gods are males who back the Republican Party?
recall a

And how come

not one of them can take a

little

good-natured kidding?
I

conversation with

my

friends

the ultimate experts in working class


social satire.

Cheech and Chong humor, street wisdom, and

"One

thing you can't joke about," said


joint

Tommy
"is re-

Chong, toking on a
ligion."

and shaking

his

head solemnly,

"Unless you can

make 'em

laugh," added Cheech Marin.

109

TIMOTHY LEARY
3.

So

now we come

to the third item of

common

sense that

guided Jefferson and Frankhn and the other agnostics who founded the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave. An
irreverent Sense of

Humor

is

the badge of a true patriot.

Real red, white, and blue Americans basically despise stuffed shirts and know-it-alls. Since 1776 we have loved to make fun of

pompous
sion

spoilsports.

Nose-thumbing

at dictator-types

is

our

fa-

vorite political pastime.

Our

first

act of rebellion against oppres-

was

a wild party.

The

revolutionaries got

drunk and dumped

the King's tea into Boston Harbor.

The

first

announced

DON'T TREAD ON ME, BUSTER.

Colonial flag proudly Their first hero

was not a knight in shining armor, but a ragtag guy with a grin on his face named Yankee Doodle who stuck a feather in his cap to make fun of the rich snobs. Most people would agree that the greatest author in American history is Samuel Clemens, aka Mark Twain. What most people don't know is that he was an outspoken defender of personal freedom and sexual liberation. Most of his work including The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn involved biting, satirical attacks on prudishness, hypocrisy
and, above
all,

religious fanaticism.

Mark Twain to make fun of the Sacred Book was a heroic deed. He got away with it because he wrote in the vulgar, ungrammatical language of the common man, and he made 'em laugh, like Cheech says. Mark Twain paid for his irreverence. His
For

books that
death.

glorified sexual pleasure never got published,

and the

writer's anti-religious tracts

were burned by

his family after his

died a deeply depressed man, saddened by the growing militarism, chauvinism, and prudishness of the people running

He

America.

make fun

This persecution of irreverent writers who celebrate life and of religion is a basic fact about American literature. It's
. . .

never mentioned in our schoolbooks. Henry David Thoreau

Edgar Allan Poe

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Walt Whitman.

110

Pornography
Scorned and ignored during their lifetimes, they were dusted off and made heroes when they were safely out of the scene. The

same thing
ley.

is

happening today with Lenny Bruce and Lord Buck-

Let me be patriotic here. America has always had the best record for defending free thought. In most other countries a writer or publisher who attacks the ruling clique, makes fun of the state's
religion, or

encourages the working class to think for itself is censored and jailed (if not put to death) without a second thought.
This couldn't happen here, could it? Surely the First Amendthe basic American sense of good humor and fair play

ment and

would prevent any administration from silencing a prominent dissident. Well, maybe and maybe not. Let's invent a scenario in which a clique of militaristnot in a bloody coup, but by control of the media. George Orwell spelled it out quite clearly in his prophetic novel, 1984. You create a benign,
industrialist

landowners take over America

smiling leader, a Big Brother

who

assures the masses that he

is

taking good care of them. You invent an enemy in Eastern Europe or Asia and start a Cold War. You whip up fear and rage. The
rich get richer,

and the poor are told that

sacrifices are to

be

expected to defeat the enemy. You don't need enormous, expensive gulags or concentration

camps to keep people from dissenting. You control the newspapers and magazines. Print media couldn't exist for a week without advertising, and the big industrial corporations dole out the advertising dollars.

Of

course, television
is

is

the key, the center of


free

people's

lives.

Work

something you do to allow you the

time to watch TV. Since the advertisers control the video content,
there's

no way the

dissent can be expressed. Since the people are

you give them lots of violence and car crashes and war. and gunplay Just as Orwell predicted, the news became totally orchestrated.
basically bored,
Start a
little

war by invading

a small island, use only military film

111

TIMOTHY LEARY
coverage, and then announce a glorious victory. We're walking
tall

again!

Arrange for a Korean airliner to fly over the airspace of the hated Eurasian empire. When the spy plane naturally gets shot

down, the media builds up a frenzy of hatred for the enemy. Now you can double the military budget. The Eurasian generals are
happy
too.

military

They get to double their weapons budget. The antipeace movements in both countries are set back and the
belts.

masses on both sides piously pull in their

The system worked perfectly until a dissenter arose, who, because he had access to the media, couldn't be crushed. He was
worst nightmare come true. He was a stubborn, idealistic redneck from the heart of the Bible Belt who had amassed a fortheir

tune from a large publishing empire. His magazine preached free-

dom
them
rural

political,

economic, cultural, and sexual.

He was

a real

populist, speaking the language of the

to enjoy their bodies


class loved
it!

working class, encouraging and think for themselves. And the


this

working

Here was

uneducated hustler from

Kentucky by way of southern Ohio who was pulling off the Mark Twain number, making obscene fun of the system. And his
magazine was getting more and more popular. So the word went out. Stop him. The powers that be
familiar remedy.
tried the

Cut

off his advertising.

No

publication can surit

vive without ad subsidies

from Big Business. But


a shocker.

didn't work.

The

wild, anarchic magazine kept growing


ads. This

even without liquor

and tobacco
their income.

was

Time and Playboy and


really

Newsweek depended on booze and


But
this

cigarette revenues for half of

wild-eyed maniac publisher


his

thumbed

his nose at the

system by running
in the

own

ads attacking smoking!


to stop the distribution
this libertarian

Okay. Call

Mafia and

tell

them

of his magazine.

No

one fucks with the Mafia. But

hustler did just that. Started his

own

distribution system.

Made

more money than

before.

Okay. Bust him!

112

Pornography

No problem.
Amendment

In a short time he

was

facing long prison sentences

in several Bible Belt states.

But

this tactic also backfired.

The

First

to the Constitution, that wretched thorn in the side

of state control, protected him. Freedom of the press, you know. And fearing for their own skins, much of the docile press came
to his defense.

What
Kill

The obvious. him. No problem. We've


next?

offed bigger wheels than this

Ohio publisher when they got in our way. Wait until he shows boom up in a Georgia small town for trial, and then boom ... A couple of blasts in his belly and Hey, what happened.^ The ornery bastard wouldn't die. We crippled him good, but he just wouldn't quit. Matter of fact, he
.
. . .

climbed out of his hospital bed feistier than ever, understandably very irritated, burning with a "don't give a damn" spirit. By 1983

he was booming atheism and ridiculing religion and taking fullpage ads in America's most prestigious newspapers, exposing the

scam and threatening to release sex tapes involving Big Brother's pal Bloomingdale and putting together an army of investigative reporters who dug up all sorts of buried scandals. And, he was publishing them in a new magazine, The Rebel. And he was running for President.
Korean
airliner

My God, this guy was becoming the country's leading dissident!


He was
a constant source of embarrassment to the rulers.

He was

encouraging others to question authority. The next step was to bust him and lock him up and announce that he was crazy.
Well, this tactic

worked

like a

tecting his journalistic sources.

When

charm. They jailed him for prohe made rowdy speeches in

court defending the First Amendment, they busted him for contempt. When he cussed out the nine Supremes, they hit him again with more prison time. In the 200 years of our history, no one,

no one, had

told off the Highest Court.

He must

be crazy.

113

TIMOTHY LEARY
Yup. Everyone agreed, the guy flipped out. Cussing judges and shouting in court? He'd gone too far. Of course, Bobby Scale did the same thing during the Chicago Seven Trial, but that v^as 1970
under a Democratic regime. This was 1984, baby, and you can't

thumb your nose

at Big B.

And

so the leading American dissident

a pow^erful, rich, influ-

ential publisher

was shipped

off to federal prison in total violation

of the Constitution. For what? For speaking out against the system. And not a word of protest.
Just like the docile Russians
rights activist

who

agreed that imprisoned

human

Andre Sakharov was nuts for defying the so did American liberals write off Larry Flynt.

inevitable,

Time magazine. My God. What fair play? Even when a dishappened sident publisher is imprisoned in a banana republic like Argentina, the word gets out. For eight months, Flynt was shackled in solitary confinement, and not one important person or journal prothis in

And

not a word of
to the

American sense of

tested.

Even the

liberals

had gone too far. Told the Supreme Court to go fuck itself. Sassed the teacher, acted like a cutup in class and got sent to the detention room in federal
prison. Like that other flake,

whispered among themselves that Larry Flynt He mocked the courts. Played the holy clown.

Lenny Bruce.

Hey, what happened to the American sense of humor? The old Yankee Doodle flourish? The Tom Sawyer caper? Seems like those frontier values have become outmoded. Have

you forgotten? This


1984.

isn't

1776. The

isn't the

wild 1960s. This

is

And

as Big Brother

Ronald told

his conservative friends in


ain't seen

Southern California a while back, "You


Big Brother's got a nice

nothing yet!"

war planned

for our prime time viewing

Bobby

Seale:

Co-founder, along with

Huey

P.

Newton, of

the Black Panther

Party, a self-defense organization

formed

in the

slums of Oakland.

114

Pornography
pleasure after the election, and he's gonna put God and His ministers back in charge of the country. It seems that God is really
pissed off at
all this

humanism and

free lifestyle

and
at

religious

tolerance and hedonism.

particularly angry But with the help of Big B, God is gonna come back to the schoolroom and to the board room and to the Pentagon

God

is

Democrats

and

liberals.

War room and whoopee we're gonna end


for
all.

this sinfulness

once and

But wait a minute. Did you say that Larry Flynt is out of prison? And he's in great shape, calm and cool and wise? You

mean we
he's

didn't crush his spirit after eight

months

in the

hold and

breaking his leg and forcing him to break his hunger strike? And back at the helm of Hustler Magazine, planning to expand

his crusade? Well, that's

bad news

for Big B.

the phone taps pick up? Oh shit, is that for real? The from Larry Flynt is: "You ain't seen nothing yet!" message

What do

115

Sexy Centerfolds
Commander-in-Chief Reagan, General Meese, and the Holy War against the Great Satan

This article was commissioned by Larry Flynt, publisher,

and Jim

Goode,

editor,

of Larry

Flynt

Publications.
It It

was sent to every member of Congress. was reprinted in several foreign languages. Includhope
it

ing Russian.
I

did some good,

if

any.

What
IS

Is

Pornography?

THIS LURID ELEVEN LETTER

WHAT phy
My

that has the right-wing

WORD: P OGRAmoraUty-mob moaning and

groaning in scandalized agitation? What is it exactly that Attorney General Meese wants to ban from our lives?
dictionary defines pornography as "written, graphic or other forms of communication intended to excite Sexual Desires."

Sexual desires? crime?


Is

Is this

bad?

Is

the exciting of erotic impulses a

the

Moral Majority

entitled to ship off to the gulags

such members of the Sex-Des gang as Hugh Heffner, Bob Guccione, William Shakespeare, Liz Taylor, Thomas Pynchon, Larry
Flynt,

James Joyce, Henri Matisse, Norman Mailer, and millions

116

Pornography

of painters, sculptors, writers, entertainers? Including Ronald Reagan's son?

Before
itans let's

we

turn America's penal system over to these new purlook at the alternatives. If Meese and Reagan and the

Ayatollah are hell-bent on repressing the age-long, time-tested,


irrepressible, irresistible Darwinian-in-out,

substitute? If they don't

want us

to

make

love,

what then, would they what do they want

us to

make?

What
Once we

are the Alternatives to Pornography?


and graphic expressions accord-

start classifying written

ing to the "desires" they are intended to stimulate,

we open up

fascinating squirm-can of thought and discussion. Come to think of it, most acts of public communication are designed to evoke
certain emotions.
stir

Most

so-called
All

news items

(sadly) are geared to


all

up needs and greeds.


shall

propaganda and

advertising

is

calculated to excite desires to be exploited by the broadcaster.

What
diets?

we

call

photos of luscious, mouth-watering foods

designed to stimulate appetites and lure people

away from

their

"Gluttonography?"
shall

advertisements featuring mouth-watering alcoholic drinks held seductively in the naked arms of alluring
call

What

we

"fuck-me" models? "Lustography?" We are all familiar with the classic ploy of leaders who wish to activate feelings of weakness, paranoia, and fear in their fol-

The goal is to scare us into submission politicians and generals. What shall we call such
lowers.

to

them

the

stuff?

"Propa-

gandography?"
Publications which trigger off a lust for knowledge, an obsessive desire to become smarter and more creative could be called
"intellography." Movies and
ratings. "X-rated" means

TV

programs could be preceded by


is

this

show
117

guaranteed to raise your

TIMOTHY LEARY
mental excellence! "R-rated" promises to reduce the level of your Repetitious Rote thinking. "PC" (Parental Caution) advises

Mom

and Dad that


abilities

their stereotypes
is

might be altered and their mental


"

enhanced. "ASS"

the highly sought after

Addicts-

Sub jects-to-Stupidity" rating shared by most day-time and primetime

TV

show^s.

The
ical

meaning of the Reagan-Meese-AyatoUah vv^ar on physbeauty becomes clear v^hen w^e pose the question: w^hat is the
real

logical good-evil opposite to

"pornography?" The answer seems

obvious: "v^ritten, graphic or other forms of communication designed to excite

VIOLENT
knife,

impulses."

What

shall w^e call expressions

gun down, punch, you can think of

which stimulate people to bomb, smash, strafe, hit, or do almost anything


tender flesh, penetrate skin, shed

to

wound

blood, induce physical pain? Gods knows this sort of Rambo progaganda has taken over the American consciousness these days.

Maybe

if

we can

give this blood-epidemic a


Shall

name we can under-

stand and cure

it.

we

call

it

"Rambo-graphy?" "Viologra-

phy?" "Sadography?" Wait. How about the

label

"Scornography" to describe written,

graphic, or other forms of communication designed to excite hostile or derogatory feelings towards others.

Pornography
It is

Is

Good; Scornography

Is

Bad

pornography is good, i.e., lifea noble, sometimes funky exaffirming, sacred, natural, joyful
pression or
friendliness,
It is

my

belief that in principle,

homage

to the

human body,

physical fun, sensual

and somatic tenderness.


belief that, in principle

and practice, Scornography and offensive, i.e., causing anger resentment, and giving offense. which excite to want to hurt others are basiExpressions people
also

my

is

118

Pornography

cally evil, life-denying, twisted, humorless, crabbed,

mean,

sick.

Obscene.

Who
It is

Are the Scornographers?


officials are also

interesting that

most anti-porn

military types, intolerant zealots eager to use force

hawkish proand police

violence to impose their grim life-styles

and grey

aesthetic pref-

erences

on

others.
I

Many

of

them

justify this

by claiming to be
like

agents of God.

refer in particular to fanatic

Scornographers

Commander-in-Chief Reagan, General Meese, the Ayatollah Khomeini, and their legions of obedient fundamentalist followers.

My
I

Positive Experiences with Pornography

happen to belong to that huge percentage of human beings who


life, is

believe that sexual desire, being the undeniable source of

and that when expressed by those whose motives are reasonably healthy and loving, creates the highest form of human
sacred,

condition.

And, to complete
flesh-wounds,
to

this confessional,
It

have an innate, physical

revulsion to violence.

disturbs

me

to look at films

which involve
bloodshed.

close-range
is

gunfire,

punch-outs,

sub-human mongoloid monstrosity. Rambo, me, How, one wonders, do these differences arise? Why do some consider love-making sacred and why do others consider it evil? In my case, sexual desires were first activated by printed materials

when I was age 12. The year was 1932. Place:


Erotic climate:
!

a small

town

in

Western Massachu-

setts.

dry and

frigid.

Cultural attitude: Irish-

Catholic-Puritan

119

TIMOTHY LEARY
Growing up in this God-ridden environment, I was taught that there was one Major Virtue and one Maximum Mortal Sin. Good was to think and act Hke the neighbors. To be proper and decent. Bad? The human body was bad. Any description of or passing reference to sexual functions was bad. Even the mention of genital organs was taboo! Any word or deed which implied acceptance or approval or interest in erotic feelings was Bad. Any actual expression of sexual desire was, of course, beyond bad. Doing
It

was
In

Evil!

my

family, morality
sisters.

her two spinster

was administered by my Mother and By age 12, 1 became aware of their strange

obsession with sexuality. I watched with fascination as they scanned every work of art, every movie, every song, every radio

show

for signs of

dismay that
dying out!
generation,
I

my

"funny business." I also realized, with genetic family, dominated by such anti-sex fervor, was

My

parents' generation

numbered 16
side.

souls.

was

the only one to carry the paternal

Of my name and
was
cor-

one of two survivors on the maternal


In

my

early teens,

realized that sexual prudishness

related with blind conformity to authority, to a grim suspicious


attitude
destiny.

towards

life

and to punishment

last- judgment theories

of

As the

last

remaining life-form in

my gene pool, I resolved

that They, the Anti-sex Gang, were not going to get control of

my

precious bodily fluids.

I managed to develop an equally sensitive counter-radar which scanned every word and image in fervent

In short order,

hopes of finding something mischievous, racy, sexy. My first experience with pornography was provided by that

most suggestive of

all

books, the Bible.

would

sit

at the dining

room

table poring over

Old Testament descriptions of

lascivious-

ness, burningly aware of the fundamentalist erection bulging in my trousers while my Mother and Aunts beamed approval from

120

Pornography

the living room.


priest.

knew

they were praying that I'd become a


in the 1930s.

There was plenty of other soft-core porn around

The Montgomery Ward mail order catalogue was loaded with pictures of young trollops, shamelessly modeling silken underwear! Pert wantons in nylon hose! Housewife harlots in steamy corsets! Voluptuous nymphets in one piece bathing suits! Sexual
repression
the very sight of bare knee or the rounded outline of

had created such a steamy hot-house atmosphere that tit and ass

produced a hot flame. I recall eye-balling with dreamy lasciviousness a Saturday Evening Post illustration of a young woman swinging on a hammock,
her head tossed back in a gesture of innocent merriment, her white dress and lace petticoat pulled up revealing two inches of
milky, white, soft, tender, moist, kissable inner thigh.

My Porn
In later years, these shy
little

Is

Your Yawn
les-

memories taught me a valuable

son about the thermo-dynamics of sexual repression. Sexual


arousal? It's all in the mind. The human being comes equipped with sexual organs wired to the brain and booted up by hormones. This hardware is activated by cues associated with sexual
invitation-availability. Depictions of these cues

become the

pre-

cious, delicate, intimate pornography of that culture. Each society and each person develops unique trigger stimuli. For example, the
illustration of the girl

on the hammock-swing which was unbearin 1934 would leave me yawning today. ably porno Even Jerry Falwell would rate it wholesome in the context of
to

me back

1986.

Consider a photo of young men wrestling in an Olympic comin muspetition, locked in sweaty competition, bodies straining

121

TIMOTHY LEARY
cular embrace. Such athletic, clean-cut activity could, for male homosexuals or certain horny, imaginative young women, be-

come

the porn trigger for

hormone

holocausts.

This poses a problem for orthodox Jewish, Christian, Arab, and Soviet censors. The sexual brain is wired to imprint as trigger
stimuli

any cue that turns one on. The human mind can thus

convert any image into a boot-up for sexual desire. Those sexy
Italians

who grow and blossom

in a

Vatican-dominated black-

robed repressive culture, have developed an amazing short-hand for soft porn. Almost every fruit, vegetable, every household appliance

broom, rake, hammer,

mop

is

endowed with double

meaning. Order a zucchini from the waiter in Naples and a ripple of giggles goes round the table. Watch lusty Luigi hold the peach in his hot hand. Observe him slice it open, slowly, slowly. Watch
Luigi dreamily extract the stone, lovingly gaze into
it,

and then

start softly licking the pink-scarlet oval indentation! Tell

torney General Meese, what Playboy centerfold as a hard-core porn peach!

is

me. Atas un-American

Hey,
quit!

it's

an endless

striptease!

The more

that religious

The bedroom joke that won't officials censor words and images

about

genitals, the

of a bodily part.

more suggestive becomes the slightest glimpse The prudish Arabs swathe their women in veils,
lust at the sight of a bare ankle.

and then writhe with


feminists

Western
this

may wonder why


when

their Islamic sisters put

up with

male repression. But the veiled


learned this in 1961,

ladies are

aware of the

allure. I

and

started flirting

Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs, with a Moroccan singer in a Tangier cafe

and suddenly found ourselves being pulled into enormous luscious nymphomaniac brown eyes as warm and melting as chocolatepudding vaginas. I'm talking about two X-rated, hardcore eyeballs whose wet nakedness was demurely veiled by skillful
fluttering eyelids.

me, this pornographic commercial exchange did not trigger violence.


Believe

for

sperm-egg

122

Pornography

So Why Does the Scornographer Ayatollah Khomeini Hate Human Sexuality?


It

may

help us understand
if

home-grown

bigots like

Reagan and
culture. Like

Meese

we look

at their counterparts in the

Arab

and Orthodox Jews, most Moslems adhere to a theocratic politic with no separation between church and state.
fanatic Christians
is the high priest of the religion, but in practice, most sensible Moslems recognize that the Sultans, the Shahs, the Nassers, the Ghadafis are all too human.

In theory, the ruler of the state

There
carries

is,

however, one form of Fundamentalist Islam which


to
its

monotheism
sin.

ultimate, idiotic conclusion.


is

The Iranian

Shiites believe that their leader

a vice-regent of God, infallible

and without
lem here

Most Moslems

consider this Persian claim to

divine authority to be a monstrous, paranoid delusion.


is

The probwith

obvious:

How can you possibly maintain any mutually


relationship

productive
zealots

human

economic or

political

who

believe themselves to be infallible agents of

The present
meini.

leader of the Shiite

Moslems

is

the Ayatollah
is

God? Kho-

one god, his name is Allah, and that he, the Head Imam, acts for God. And he's got 50 million people, a police force, and an army ready to
every whim. Teenage kids and wild-eyed adults are eager to die for him. Why not? What uneducated person wouldn't give up a dusty life with camels, sand fleas, and no hot water if
kill at his

He

operates under the sick illusion that there

guarantees paradise in return? Who wouldn't? Well, free Americans wouldn't. Because guys like Jefferson and Franklin risked their lives to form a nation

God

where church and


they want

state are separated,

where anyone can say what


state to stop

BUT you can't invoke the power of the

others from expressing their views. Right General Meese? Right

Ronnie?

123

TIMOTHY LEARY

Why Does Scornographer Ronald Reagan Hate Sexuality?


Ronald Reagan hates sex and loves violence. His Scornographic tendencies were clearly revealed when he vwas interviewed about
the movie

The Godfather. My, how the Ayatollah Reagan gushed this great work of art. However, there was one sordid scene that disturbed Nancy and Ron. It was that disgusting
and raved about

episode after the wedding when, in the nuptial chamber, the young virgin bride drops her blouse and walks toward her new

husband with a sweet, loving smile on her face

WITH HER NAmost


vi-

KED BOOBS SHOWING!


Interesting,

huh? The Godfather was,

in its time, the

olent

movie ever made.

blatant glorification of gore, blood,


all in

mass execution,
ice

Sicilian treachery, assassination

the serv-

The Godfather was a Chernobyl catastromelt-down of phe, decency that showed Hollywood how wanton violence could pay off at the old B.O. But there was that
of organized crime.
a

and marital

one, brief socially-redeeming scene that reflected legal tenderness the one love, shared by a young married couple

scene Ayatollah Ronald

would have censored.


wholesome bodily tenderness?

How

did Ronald develop this sick, kinky preference for inde-

cent bodily violence instead of

Why does Ronnie prefer to watch faces convulsing in pain rather than pleasure? It springs from his Midwestern, fundamentalist
Christian beliefs. Although his

PR

staff

has tried to hush


is

it

up,

Reagan has
kinky sect
lah,

made known
is

it

perfectly clear that he

an adherent of that

as the Disciples of Christ. Just like the Ayatol-

Reagan

a self-appointed, official vice-regent of

God

chosen

to lead the elect in the final

Armageddon battle against the forces of Satan, the Black King of Democrats, heretics, fun-lovers, and the sexually sane.
Ronnie and Meese
truly, sincerely, honestly believe that
it is

immoral to disagree with

their policies.

124

Pornography

Most

Christians (and

all

non-Christians) consider these Fun-

damentalist claims to be special agents of God monstrous and sinful. But there is undeniable appeal there. Life can at times seem
confusing, baffling, frustrating. There are so many points of view and ways to go. Everyone, at times, longs for some certainty,

some

clear-cut black-and-white signal about

what

to do.
it's all

And then
very sim-

the Fundamentalists
ple.

come

along, announcing that

There's one God.


Bible.

My

God. And one book, the Koran, Tal-

mud,
is

One

thing to do: Obey!

And anyone who

disagrees

a hell-bound, heathen, heretic dupe of the devil permitted to loot, enslave, and kill.

whom

you are

Now

the rules of democracy allow, indeed encourage, anyone

to express any damn-fool creed they wish.

Freedom of Speech

as

guaranteed by the

Bill

of Rights.

The trouble comes, when Fundamentalist fanatics get their cruel, unforgiving hands on the wheels of government and start using the courts and the police and the military to enforce their weird beliefs. The great enemy of any dictatorship is, of course,
free speech, free press.

Fundamentalists don't concede these


this

liberties to others.

Fueled

unshakable sense of moral superiority, convinced that God by has elected them to be His favorites, they feel it is their duty to
crush, without mercy, heretics, disbelievers,

and

political rivals.

You've seen them


of fair play.

No

These guys simply have no sense sense of sportsmanship or mutual respect or rein action.

laxed fun or common-sense give and take. They have to be


right
all

100%
with

the time.

They

can't relax

and laugh and play

fair

you because God's Agents

can't fraternize with the Devil's.

Pornography

Is

the Front Line of


like the

Freedom

Self-appointed agents of

God
it

hate pornography because

Ayatollahs and the Reagans incites people to think about love

125

TIMOTHY LEARY
\

and pleasure and fun and intimate communication. These are the loose, giggly human feelings which encourage disrespect for God and Authority. Pornography loosens the
dividual.
state's control of the in-

Authoritarian leaders fear Pornography, because erotic behavior

unauthorized ways. Theocratic leaders love Scornography because feelings of violence can be easily manipulated and directed towards real or

allow^s individuals to rev^ard themselves in

imagined enemies of the regime.

Pornography
There
is

Is

the Touchstone of

Freedom
measure the
in-

one

test

which

political scientists use to

any country. Freedom of the press, and in partoleration of ticular, open pornography. The countries of Europe which are the most democratic are those which allow the expressions of sexual love and bodily dex of freedom
in

beauty. Sweden.

Denmark. Holland. France.

less free the country, the more censorship of pornography. For decades, Portugal and Spain were held captive to the dictatorships of Salazar and Franco. When the hated dictators passed

The

on, the very day after the democratic regimes assumed power, the

kiosks and newsstands blossomed with Playboy^ Penthouse, and Hustler.


It is

no accident that 7-11


in

stores started

banning these benign

1986 when the Rambo-Reagan-Meese glorification magazines of warfare, bombing civilians, and Star Wars were reaching their
peak.

126

Pornography

Attorney-General Meese: Agent of God


With the awesome power of the federal poUce forces, both uniformed and secret, at his disposal, we expect the U.S. Attorney General to be a model of fairness, ethics, and compassionate understanding.

Throughout history we have seen that the gravest threat


democratic order appears
fanatic partisan of

to

when a nation's top cop is a zealot, a one religious or political point of view. Which brings us to the newest Darth Vader enemy of the loveforce, Edwin Meese. Perhaps if we can track his roots we can
understand and neutralize his ruthless self-righteousness.

Ed Meese grew up in Oakland, California, in a tight-knit family of ethnocentric German immigrants whose strict authoritarian attitudes made them ill-equipped for any profession except government bureaucrat. The Meese family belonged to the Missouri
Synod of the Lutheran church, a
literalism,
its

fanatic sect noted for

its

biblical

unquestioning Prussian hierarchy, and


state.
It

its

abject

Teutonic devotion to the

would be inconceivable for Meese to have selected a profession which required intelligent choice, free competition, independent decisions, and tolerant harmony with others. Meese couldn't operate in a free-trade scene.

He

couldn't be a doctor or a teacher or even an elective


to serve the

official.

Meese was trained


principle.

Lutheran-God and the Fuhrer-

In his formative teen years,


athletic field learning

team
the

sports.

Meese was not to be found on the sportsmanship and the give-and-take of No, young Sunday school Edwin was a member of

Oakland High School military club, the Sabers. At Yale University, Meese was a mediocre student, but made
for his inability to think by enthusiastic participation in conthe debating team, the Lutheran student or-

up

servative activities

ganization, student politics.

We

all

know

the type.

127

TIMOTHY LEARY
Meese's twisted attitudes toward pain-pleasure, love, and war are reflected in the bizarre circumstances of his wedding. His
bride, Ursala,

was

a highly conservative Protestant from a family

of government bureaucrats. Ursala herself


tion officer.
(!)

was a former proba-

on a naval

The marriage reception was held in an officer's club base. The wedding cake was cut with a military

about that for kinky Third Reich symbolism, this weird mixture of Christian Soldier piety and state-authorized
sabre!

How

murder!

The Tax
Edwin Meese adheres
Bureaucratic power
tioningly obey.
is

Collector's Son
best de-

to that right-wing politic that

is

scribed as "national or state socialism."


the only reality.

The

state

is

everything.

You

docilely

You

gravitate, naturally, to city hall.

and unquesYou maneuthe

ver, like Soviet apparatchiks, to get control of the


state.

power of

Note

that

none of Edwin's

fiercely

German

clan has a free-

open-market, competitive-capitalistic bone in their These body. guys, brought up in a suspicious, closed, ethnic sect, despise American fair play. These guys simply don't understand
enterprise,

our flamboyant, Yankee Doodle, free-agent, good-natured spirit. Hey, who has to play fair when you're doing the work of God

and the All-powerful


Ed,

state.

who

had
the

to

life on government payrolls, never where the worry money was coming from. Ed's dad was

has spent his adult

Tax

Collector.
is

one word which can explain most of the conflict, violence, and warfare which currently plagues humanity. The same word explains Ed Meese's crusade. That word is theocracy.
There

The dictionary

defines

or government officials

Theocracy as "Government by priests claiming divine sanction." So please

128

Pornography
meet theocrat Ed Meese: Scourge of Liberals and Secular Humanists.

As we have

all

gerously volatile high-octane fuel

Anyone who
evil.

is propelled by that danknow^n as moral righteousness. disagrees with His God and His politics is immoral,

come

to learn,

Ed Meese

Remember when Ed
the Bill of Rights

called the

American

Civil Liberties

Union

a "criminals' lobby" and thus, in one mean-spirited phrase, sabres and the Jeffersonian tradition? And this guy

heads our justice department? Remember Christmas 1983, when

this

plump bureaucrat,

whose fat snout has been buried in life, announced that there was no
hunger problem in the United
paying for
ther King's
it."

the public coffer for his entire

"authoritative" evidence of a

States.

to soup kitchens because "the food

is free,

According to Ed, people go and that's easier than

Remember when Meese infuriated Blacks by using Martin Luname to attack affirmative action? Recall when Meese instructed the Justice Department to protect

Teamster President Jackie Presser? When he decided not to prosecute the executive of E. F. Hutton after they were nabbed in a
flat-out fraud case?

When

he violated the Constitution by using


prohibition-

federal troops to harass


style

Mendocino pot farmers and

smugglers?
got jobs at the federal hog-trough for who had given him loans or helped
failed to

Remember when Meese


several Republican friends

him with mortgage payments? Or when he repeatedly


disclose financial dealings as required

by law?

Remember when Meese arranged


in the

for a

promotion to Colonel

Army

Reserve and his transfer from the inactive reserve in

violation of federal as well as

Army

regulations?

129

TIMOTHY LEARY

How

can

we

explain this flagrant disregard for ethics and this

consistent criminal behavior by a

man who

claims to be religious,
slippery-

patriotic, and law-abiding? Is it another case of the Nixon hypo-cracy on the part of the nation's top cop?

Nope.

It's

just

humanity

for the last

another example of the disease that has tortured few thousand years. Theocratic fanaticism.

Like every pope

who declared a Holy Crusade against Arabs for God and plunder. Like every Islamic crackpot who shrieks "Jihad:
colonists

Holy War!" Like those European


have been

who,

for

killing, looting, raping the heathen for Like the sternly white-Protestant government of South Afprofit. rica. Like every religious fanatic in history, Edwin Meese sincerely

500 years Christ and

believes that he

and

his fellow Christian fundamentalists are di-

vinely authorized to use their powerful positions to reward their friends, punish and indeed kill their rivals. If you take what you

want

in

God's name,

is

that stealing?

If

you burn a heathen,

is

that not virtue?

How

naive of

me

to ask!

Who's Gonna Win the War Against Pornography?


Ed Meese and Ronnie Reagan
about
it.

are having a

moment, no doubt

They've grabbed control of the all-too-willing military

world and they're hell-bent on


Action,

and law enforcement apparatus of the greatest country in the their Crusade against Affirmative

Communism,

Ghadafi,

Rights, Democrats, liberals,

Nicaragua, Drugs, and secular humanists.

Women's And now

they're gunning for Sexual Desire!

Good

luck, Ed. Fat chance, Ronnie.

130

Pornography

don't

it's

want to ring you down from your morality high lads, but time you learned a certain historical lesson. Listen: You
win
elections

control-freaks can

and manipulate the press and whip up war-paranoias. Agent of God, around in cars Ed, riding police sneering and scorning the godless

You can

feel like a Special

liberals.

You can

terrorize Central America.

You can

stand

tall

and threaten the Russians. But when you tangle with pornography, the celebration of Love Impulse and Physical Beauty, you're
out of your league, plump wimp.

When you

attack sexual

mag-

netism and erotic desire you're outmatched. Your cruel saber slashing into the soft, sweet, yielding wedding cake?
take,

ROTC A mis-

Edwin. She basically doesn't

like

it,

Edwin. Neither do your

children.

Sure,

you can

get your pictures in the paper leading the Crusade

against physical beauty


labels put

and sexual

desire.

You can

get

warning

on rock albums. You can harass 7-11

store owners.

You can
tler

even get vigilante groups to

bomb

7-1 1's for selling Husreally think

and Playboy and Penthouse. But do you


this planet for four billion years?

you can

suppress the wild, pulsing love impulse that has kept Hfe evolving

on
It's

Ron and
in. It

Ed,

let

me

tell

a secret.

The

secret of

you something you don't want to hear. life. Better not call Nancy and Ursala

might upset them. You'll have to break the news to them

later on.

Here's an update on The Situation, lads. You've got yourself in a real bad mess. You really fucked up lads. You've signed up
for the losing battle of

No
time.

The Big Game. wonder you're so worried and angry and warlike

all

the

We can understand your paranoid feelings of being surrounded by a breeding, seething sea of sexually-aroused hostile
life-forms.

You're in deep trouble, guys.

You

set yourselves

up to

insult

and attack and derogate The Force. The

Periodic, Recurring Pro-

131

TIMOTHY LEARY
-\

cess.

The

Life System, so big, so old, so powerful


it.

you

can't even

conceive of

you
call

so varied and uncontrollable and promiscuous don't even have a proper name for it. You call it Sin. You
It's

it

Bad and

that ain't good.


it

Scientists call

Life, Evolution, Biology.

Poets describe
netic,

it

as Passionate, Sexy, Saucy, Irresistible,

Magit.

Darv^inian.

Up

in

Boston,
it.

democratic

beans

do
it.

Argentines-without-means do

Even educated Meese do

Some
ille-

enemy you've chosen, Ed.


gal.

She's raw, moist, steamy. She's naked,

dripping. She's usually smiling.

Always unauthorized. Often


all

And

she's everywhere!

Fucking

the time. Copulating.

Breeding. Seeding.

Your soft-skinned enemy is always thinking up new ways to outwit you, Ed, trying to look better, dressing up, oiling its skin.
It's

hot-looking.

It

laughs at organizations, institutions, commis-

sions, bureaucracies, religions, judges, priests, rabbis, ministers,

Soviet commissars.

You can pass laws against it, hire Czars to control it, jail those who glorify it. You can organize your 19 84- Anti-Sex Leagues. But
you can never stop
it.

You know

that, don't

you Ron and Ed?

Is

that

why

you're

preparing the final Solution, the all-out mageddon Plan? You're not gonna turn
lipstick
it

War on
tail at

Life?

The Ar-

the sight of pink

and run

like a

out in one

final slug-fest.

coward. You're gonna stand fast and have You're gonna arm yourself with au-

thorized erectile units, automatic ejaculator-weapons, big-boy

nukes, and enormous pulsing lasers.

Not

to

mention biological

weapons,

acid

rains,

scorched earth policies,

paraquat sprays, agent orange mists, chemical warfare strikes, and industrial

technologies guaranteed to

blow

off the

ozone

layer.

you're hell-bent on rooting out, suppressing, mechanizing, crushing every manifestation of the smiling,

No

question about

it,

sexy, dirty

life

force.

You

gions of your Lord

come down

guys can't wait until the antiseptic Leto lay waste the preterite heathens

132

Pornography

and take you


heaven.

faithful androids

up

to your germ-free Lutheran

But it won't work, boys. Even Jesse Helms and Reverend Pat Robinson can't help you censor that four letter word you fear the
most, that four-billion-year tribute to sexual desire.

Jesse Helms: Ultraconservative Republican Senator

Helms was the primary advocate for school prayer and the death penalty, and a major enemy of the National Endowment for the Arts.

133

New York,

October 1966. Leary presents "The Reincarnations of Jesus Christ." Leary's League of Spiritual Discovery hopes to distribute LSD and marijuana as sacraments to its members.

UP I/Cor bis-Bettmann

Leary and his daughter Susie, 1966. Archive Photos

Leary with son Jackie, 1966. Archive Photos

1966. The original UPI caption reads: "A mandala of the 'Earth Mother,' a mattress and cushions resting on the floor and used

Tim

instead of chair, couch or bed these are part of the 'world' of Leary. Perhaps his 'world' may seem strange to some. But it
is

is

the world he has chosen to live in and for which he

willing to

pay the price." UPI/Corbis-Bettmann

Leary with fourth wife Rosemary Woodruff. UPI/Corbis-Bettmann

On his farm in Millbrook, New York,


Photos

1967. Santi

Visalli Inc./Archive

With Joanna Harcourt-Smith. Express Newspapers/Archive Photos

The Berkeley Lectures


1969

Editor's Note:

The following
series

series

of five lectures was

delivered at the Free University of Berkeley in February

of 1969. The lecture

was

originally titled

He-

donic Psychology, or The Psychology of Pleasure. A small portion of the text was published in Psychology

Today

in

January 1973,

Psychedelic Psychology

THE BEGINNING

WOULD

LIKE

TO SAY

WHO I AM AND WHO

I'm speaking for Rosemary, or rather I would Speaking say she is speaking through me. I'm also speaking for our extended family, The Brotherhood of Eternal Love, a group of 40
for.

IN I'm

or 50 people

who

have been sharing the hedonic voyage.

There are going to be no dogmatic facts or statements laid down. It's simply our trip. That's the way it's got to be. You know, I'm sure, by now, that you must never believe anyone's
statements about their
trip.

Does

it

interest

you and
all

stir

up

thoughts in

you?
so very different. Yes,
it's

We're
system
is

all

true that we're

one.

The

unified.

But

we

are quite different. Consider your family

members: your wife, your closest friends. You live with them for many, many years and then you discover that you can't transfuse
blood for them. Different blood types. The calcium in our bones may be different. If we have to pass on organs then perhaps we have to seek hematologically similar strangers. The more we understand about the complexities about biochemistry, the more we
realize that the diseases that

we

nurture in our bodies, the anti-

body systems we cherish

are different.

We

exist as

unique uni-

137

TIMOTHY LEARY
verses.
trips
I

And

this

makes us cautious and humble about laying our

on each other. remember many years ago, when I was a psychologist living in the Berkeley Hills, I was unfortunate enough one night to have to go to some sort of parent/teachers meeting as a psychological expert and talk about child-rearing. It really made me feel bad. I
never did
it

again, because

realized that anything

would say

would have very little to do with 50% of the people there, except maybe to lay a new alien trip on them. Maybe for 25% of the people it would be the right thing to say and for 25% of the people it would be exactly the wrong thing to say. This is not a matter of despair, and it's not to suggest that these differences are in any way ominous. As a matter of fact, that's the aesthetic part
of the game, to appreciate these differences and start harmonizing and merging them. This is no guru-student game. We're all here to be gurus for

each other and your guru is always popping up in the strangest places. Basically each of us is his own guru, but we can get help

from moment to moment, from day to day, from anyone that's likely to come along. Almost everything that I've ever said I have
learned from gurus who were half my age. The good teacher picks out a question that's important to him or you and he invites you

on the

quest.

Before going on to the more formal topic which is the Hedonic Revolution and the Psychology of Pleasure, I'd like to say a little

more about where we're at to avoid misunderstanding drugs, and perhaps your own perspective of who I am. I'd like to lay out some myths or misapprehensions
bit

the psychedelic experience,

about

LSD

that I'd like to clarify at the beginning so that

you

won't be

irritated or

confused as the conversation develops.

138

The Berkeley Lectures

Myths About LSD


The
IF
First Myth: IT'S OKAY TO TAKE PSYCHEDELIC DRUGS YOU'RE SERIOUS-MINDED BUT YOU SHOULDN'T TAKE

THEM FOR KICKS.


True or
I

false?

think

my

answer to

this

myth

is

fairly obvious.

think that you should take psychedelic drugs for kicks. There's this weird illusion that dope should have a practical reward. Marijuana's all right, for example,
raise
if it

can reduce alcoholism and

your income. We're just beginning the neurological revolution. We know now that we can change consciousness. It doesn't

make any

difference

what you've got going


direct

control, manage, and

your own

you don't consciousness toward natin space if

ural freedom.

interesting experience once on a stage like this at MIT. was having a debate with Professor Letvin. He's a psychiatrist I had been somewhat friendly with when I was at Harvard. He stood on a stage and said that he didn't want to debate on the dangers of LSD and marijuana because there was nothing to be worried about. The main issue was moral was I the devil? and that's pretty far out for an MIT psychiatrist in 1967 or whenever it was to stand there and talk to MIT people and talk about the
I I

had an

devil.

That was the saddest moment of


I

my

life. I felt

for the

first

time that
issue

had met someone who understood


said that

at least

was about. He

good was

the logical,

what the rational mind

and anything that threatened to loosen or divert or turn off for one minute this divine manifestation of two billion revolutions

was

the devil.

Another myth: LSD

WILL STOP THE REVOLUTION.


I

Now

the facts of the matter are that

consider the psychedelic

139

TIMOTHY LEARY
drugs plus electric rock and roll to be the most powerful revolutionary agents man has ever know^n. It's so obvious and so logical

and empirically demonstrable. When anyone in any country in the world today including America, Europe, Western Europe,
Eastern Europe, anyone
ing something that

who

is illegal.

turns on today is automatically doThat means that the person who is

going to turn on must, in his

own

mind, and eventually


in

in his

own

government Peking or in Moscow or in Stockholm or in Washington, "I don't believe the government
behavior, say to the

has the right to control my consciousness."

my mind or pass laws against my changing

is

Turning on is a political act. It's the kind of political act that most characteristic of the new revolution which is the hedonic

revolution.

ons are

The weapons here are not Molotov bombs. The weapthe radiant eye and the smiling face, the holy orgasm

as a revolutionary

weapon

it

can never be overlooked.

A
If

second fascinating thing about psychedelic drugs as revoluis

tionary agents

that they put

you want

to turn

you into a conspiracy immediately. on you can't go to the drugstore, right, and

mail in a coupon to get your dope. You have to engage in a rather risky contract with someone that you trust enough and that trusts

you enough.
in a perfect

Now this
efficiency

loving, benevolent

way. But

still I

exist

and the
it

network does not work would say that the dope network does and the loyalty and the brotherhood and

develops is a socioeconomic fact that has been overlooked by most of our scholars.
sisterhood

Now

there's a third political aspect to turning


It

on that

is

ex-

tremely important. immediately puts you on the right side in the cowboys and Indians game or the cops and robbers game or

whatever they called


kid. Imagine, for

your neighborhood when you were a example. Das Kapital. And just suppose Roseit

in

mary and I could get in our time machine and go back and knock on his door and we'd walk in and say, "Karl, baby, I've got something here for you, something that
is

guaranteed within six

140

The Berkeley Lectures


months
to turn 75 percent of the student body, the aristocratic
St.

student body of the University of of the Cossacks and into the free

Petersburg on the right side

man game."

Another, fourth, and the most important revolutionary aspect of the psychedeUc strength is that it does internally, neurologically, vy^hat
it is doing outside, symbolically. You see, the symbolic forms or the behavioral forms of revolution are placards and pick-

and demonstrations, storming the Bastille, and burning draft cards, and these are important and necessary at a particular moeting

ment. But they're short-lived. And they really don't change a lot of minds. They tend to solidify a position: You burn your draft
card and

everyone a little more seriously. These are but the symbolic acts, revolutionary act of taking a psychedelic drug is very important because it anarchizes your nervous system.
it

solidifies

It

does the same thing inside that you want to do outside, that

is

liberate.

Now

that we're

on

this topic
this:

The

Fifth

Myth: I'm frequently

counted upon to say

BLACKS DON'T SEEM TO TURN


of the

ON. THE BLACKS DON'T LIKE TO TAKE LSD. Well, I don't know about that. I have talked to most

black militant leaders in the country and not one of them said he'd throw me in jail when he took over. As a matter of fact,

most of them turn on. As a matter of


the psychedelic experience
is

fact, a

to say that blacks are

good way of defining more turned

on than whites.
routine here.
I

I'm not going into any liberal, masochistic don't feel badly about this because I can say flatly

Now

that almost everything important I've learned in the last eight years about how to live a life of joy and increasing love and

beauty and sensuality and freedom

I've learned

from colored peo-

went to India and studied with brown people over ple. there. And I've listened to the rhythms and to the messages and to the teachings of the black Americans. Soul on Ice is a very
That
is, I

141

TIMOTHY LEARY
powerful statement of the turned on position and of course, the
red Indians are here to teach us a great deal.

movement is a technicolor movement and whites. The Tao-dye is always blending.

The psychedelic there ain't no pure

Another interesting thing about the black movement: It's very important that we're clear about what's happening. The blacks
did you say? Well, that's exBlacks are saying, We're dropactly ping out of the American system of reward and punishment, that
are in favor of dropping out.

What
is.

what

the black

movement

they're completely irrelevant

school,

we want our own


all

That's

that

is

We want our own we want our own thing. department, meant by the term drop out. You drop out and
and
ridiculous.

do your own

thing.

We

have a tremendous amount to learn from

our black prophets and our black gurus. Another side of the issue here is that all the black
is

man wants

a white

woman. Maybe

in the early

days of our integration that

You've got to accept the fact that if God is here in any form, she is here in the form of a colored woman. The dark goddess has always been the source of basic
true for a very small minority.

was

ecstasy in the rooted seed process.

Now

the Sixth

Myth

has to do with research.

It's

the liberal

kind of Harper's, New Republic, cisco Chronicle position to say,

New York Times, San Fran"DRUGS LIKE LSD AND MARIJUANA SHOULD BE AVAILABLE TO RESEARCH SERIOUS-MINDED, APPROVED, FEDERALLY FUNDED RESEARCH ..."
Well,
that
if
I

want

to say right here for the record, here

and now,

anyone

is

can change

my

going to have control over the chemicals which mind, the last person I want to have control over
I want want my brothers and sisters have control over my mind and I want you to,

these chemicals

is

a serious-minded government agent.

Rosemary
at the

to have those drugs

and

ranch to

142

The Berkeley Lectures


too.

You

control these things yourself with the help of your wife


friends.
is

and your husband and your


search, of course,
is
. .

The whole thing about

re-

that research
.

a new, white elephant in this

country. Research

do research on
experience?

ecstasy,

can you do research on happiness, can you can you do research on your spiritual

Obviously you

can't.

Well, yes you can.

Maybe

we'll learn

you want to and if that's your thing, do it. something from it. I'm very impressed, for exIf

ample, by the research that Johnson and Matthews did on the sexual experience.
It's

perfectly analogous

the psychedelic experience.

if it's different at all from Houston and Matthews hooked up

many women and

they recorded all the physiological events that occurred during, before, and after orgasm and it's a great deal. I think maybe a lot of people can benefit by reading that book but I
don't think that the only time you should have sex
search.
atrists
I

is

when

it's

re-

can

just imagine that

if

you get

some government

psychi-

studying the sexual response, you'd really have a heavy thing. We gave this couple intelligence tests during the event and their IQ dropped. They can't even divide 7 into 100 backwards.

Matter of

fact they can't

even hold a normal conversation while


is

they're copulating.

The

social intelligence

destroyed completely.
noises.

They knock over vases and make grunting


does to the heart
rate. Clearly

And what

it

sex should be under the auspices

of government scientists only.

Laymen

are not allowed.

Masters and Johnson: Virginia Johnson and William Masters (humorously


referred to here as

Houston and Matthews, and Johnson and Matthews?)

are best

known

for their investigation of the physiology of sexual intercourse

using volunteers at the Reproductive Biological Research Foundation in St. Louis. Their reports, Human Sexual Response and Human Sexual Inade-

quacy, were wildly popular in the late '60s and early '70s.

143

TIMOTHY LEARY
The Seventh Myth.
that IT'S

seventh frequently appearing

comment

is

TOO BAD THAT PSYCHEDELIC DRUGS ARE


I

IL-

LEGAL.
True or False? Well,
fact,
I

don't worry about

it

at

all.

Matter of

just

know

that psychedelic drugs vhave to be a-legal.

How

can you have an uptight repressive controlled government


ing a hedonic, spiritual chemical?

licens-

You know that


to

sex

is illegal

you have

to have a special license

my planet. I said, "Lovemaking down you have to have a government license to do it." And it really blew their minds up there. Now you know you're on the right track in the pursuit of freedom and ecstatic pleasure and God if you're in
it. I

do

sent this back to

here,

trouble with the law, and


bit.

When we

were

at

you're not you have to worry a little Harvard, matter of fact the guy that threw
if

us out of Harvard in 1963


rijuana
this

made

this statement.

He

said,

"Ma-

and LSD:
is

It's like

goldfish swallowing,

it's

a fad."

Now

one of the leading social psychologists in the country. If you have any messianic or visionary solution to make everyone happy and joyous and loving and you start talking about it
set

man

and

up a

little

shop or
is

start a little institute

and you do
it

it

and

so forth the government


to work.

not going to bother you unless

starts

My

month when
No,
can
I

opinion of Scientology has just tripled in the last I see that they're getting in trouble. They must be

doing something good


don't think that

and Wilhelm Reich and so

forth.

legalize

freedom.

we can expect that a controlled society You can't expect it. There is a risk involved.
is

Well, so what? I'm glad there

a risk. I'm glad the psychedelic


just can't sign

experience

is

something that

you

up on the easy

Wilhelm Reich: Austrian psychoanalyst and author of The Function of the Orgasm and The Sexual Revolution^ Reich was convinced on the importance
of regular orgasms for the mental health of
the

men and women. He

invented

Orgone Accumulator, purported to

collect

orgasmic energy, and died in

prison for promoting "fraudulent treatment."

144

The Berkeley Lectures


pay card plan. I'm glad you have to put your chips out your spiritual and your emotional and your realistic chips. If the game
isn't

a risk

what

are

you playing

for?

Now
and

another myth, the Eighth Myth, constantly debated back


is

forth,

that

LSD CHANGES LSD

YOU FOR BETTER OR FOR


I

WORSE.
I'm not sure whether
unfold you.
It

does change you.

think

it

may

may

bring to the surface things that

you weren't

aware of and again we've got to be realistic about this. They can't be good or bad in the social sense or even the psychological sense.

We

run, here, into the horrible fact of karma.


statistical

The

DNA code

does play a

game. There are

just lots of

heavy karmic,

genetic trips that we're carrying around inside our

DNA code. I'm

not sure that anything happens during or after LSD that wouldn't have happened anyway. It may have speeded it up. A lot of people were confronted with their inevitable psychosis at the age of eighteen instead of the age of
fifty

when

they're running for Congress.

Now,
is

see there are

some

rather sober facts here. Mental illness

country and in every race, in every culture. So one out of ten people in their lifetime has a severe long-term
apparently in every
is

mental breakdown. In our country, say, one out of ten to end up in a mental hospital sooner or later.

going

days the hoax was that LSD made people crazy, so that people took LSD and something strange was happening. So a fellow says, "Oh, I'm crazy." They'd go to UCLA
in the early

Now

hospital
that

and Fisher would was being laid down.

write another paper. That


It

was

you

crazy,

there's
their

go to UCLA hospital. still one out of ten people

was the trip Time Magazine: LSD makes Well, that hoax is over now but
in in this

room

that are slated by

DNA code

to have a severe psychosis.

Well, after eight or ten years of it, I can only conclude that LSD probably prevents the number of inevitable psychoses. Where it

145

TIMOTHY LEARY
does help them unfold,
it

does

it

under a voluntary circumstance

where you know

the drug that's doing it, not like you masturbated at the age of three or something like that or whatever
it's

your heavy karmic trip is. At the present moment I would say that some people have entered the mental hospital after taking LSD but far fewer than you would expect statistically. The same
is

true of suicide.
is

The

suicide rate
five

get

from the Encyclopedia


in eight years
I

Brittanica

roughly two out of


kill

hundred people
think

or an eight-year-span will

themselves.

it's

a miracle,

considering that one

LSD

suicide headlined for three months.

They're well-reported. I think we can say that LSD has cut down the suicide rate because you go through so many death-rebirth
experiences in any ten seconds of a
trip,

why

bother about the

messy

details?

Now

there

is

a paradox here because the


it all

the nature of energy

boils

down

to

more you probe into plus-minus and it's all a

50-50 choice, good-bad, health-illness. You're never going to get the odds better than 50-50 at any one second so that I don't think
that

LSD

changes the balance from good to bad or positive to


it's

negative. In the last analysis,

merely giving you more insight


It's

into the structure of the positive-negative systems.

always a

paradox and

any moment or at that moment of confrontation is open say "yes" instead of "no" and hope for the best. So much for wild claims on what LSD does for you.
all

you can do

at

Now in Myth Number Nine we have here the statement that LSD BREAKS CHROMOSOMES.
I wish they did. This is an evolutionary exand I see chromosomes and white blood corpuscles simperience ply as an outside layer of communication. They have nothing to do with the germ plasm. So we're prepared to accept the fact that

Well, you know,

LSD

could break
It

down chromosomes,
leave a

not break, you

know snap,
when you

crack.

would

communication message
146

like

The Berkeley Lectures


write on a blackboard. You're not going to leave something broken behind.
But, unfortunately for our visionary hopes,

LSD

does not break

chromosomes. This was a hoax. That's a pretty heavy thing to say that something will affect your unborn children. The antipleasure forces have run through a series of dire warnings.

enough they ran through exactly the same warnings that the AMA was running through a hundred years ago. Rosemary brought back from a swap meet she's addicted to swap meets anyhow, a book leather-bound and gold. I opened
Interestingly

most impressive book I'd ever seen, parchment was written by an MD who lived in Boston one paper. hundred years ago and it had the imprimatur and the stamp of
it

up.

It

was

the

And

it

the

Massachusetts Medical

Society,

and the Congregational

Society, and the Boston Globe, and the New York Times. Everyone said "Read this book." And I opened it up and I read the chapter on self-abuse. It was titled Self-Abuse: How

Church Medical

It

Rises

and

Is

Maintained.

realized that

was

in the

hands of

either a great

really unbelievable.

humorist or a terribly guilty masturbator. It was He laid down a whole trip on masturbation

and

it

was

exactly
said,
tell

what

they're saying about psychedelic drugs

today.

He

can always

you know, first of all it makes you crazy. You one when you see them. They have a kind of an
about them.

easy, shiftless look

He

said in particular

you can

tell

how the

female masturbator walks because she kind of slinks.


it

Not

mental hospital you'll be absolutely put you but that's not the worst part certain to go to a mental hospital
only will
of
in a
it.

Really,

it's

a disease.

And
I

there are

all

sorts of diagnostic

clues as to

how

to pick

one out.
can

He

says, "I don't care

how much
The
. .

the

boy or

girl lies

to me,
it is
. . .

tell

one when

see them."
.

worst thing about of the worst things

well, not the worst thing


is

but one
is

is

that masturbation

a disease

which

really

worse than typhoid because with typhoid maybe you back on your feet but once a masturbator is on the road to

a cure can get

147

TIMOTHY LEARY
pleasure, hedonism,

and sexuality
ill

mental hospital or the house of

there's no ending except the shame. Then you had: It rots


it

your brain and


There's just no

it's

bad for your digestion and


at
all.

loosens the will.

power

The masturbator
all.
if

just

won't buckle

down

to the Protestant Ethic at

But worst of

all, if

you don't
our

care about going to the mental hospital,

you don't care about


forth, think of

your body, your parents, your country, and so children. Masturbation leads to monsters.
I'll

be talking in the third of these lectures, talking about the psychedelic communities, about LSD babies and how they're con-

grow up and blow our minds. But I will say this that the chromosome hoax is pretty well accepted now as what it started out to be: the chromosome hoax. There's a friend of mine that works for the government and when the chromosome thing came out he was very worried. He's
ceived and
they're

how

born and

how

they

a worrying type anyway.


likes to take

And

he's very scientific although he just

and he was very alarmed because his wife was pregnant, and they had had two babies before he and she had taken LSD, and he was very concerned. So
for spiritual purposes

LSD

being very responsible and conscientious he had his blood taken and sent over to the study that was doing this and the scientists

came back, and said, "Wow, your blood you've had it." So he was really very worried. All during the period of pregnancy he was worried about it. When the baby was born, the baby was
perfect, so he

began thinking about it. And then the other studies came out, casting doubt on it so he decided he was going to get involved in a study that was being done, a double blind study

where the person counting the chromosomes didn't know where they came from. And they knew that some people had taken LSD
to be analyzed in this double blind thing

and they knew that others hadn't and they were sending them off and he took his blood

it into the LSD group. He knew it was there but men who were counting it didn't and the results came back. Number one: The LSD samples did not have an increase in chro-

and he snuck

the

148

The Berkeley Lectures

mosome

breaks.

And number two

to

make

this a

happy

story:

He

does not have chromosome breaks himself and the whole thing was a scandal which put his wife and himself through a very

heavy and worrisome period of three or four months. Of course, that's what has been done in a very, I would say, sadistic way to
thousands and thousands of young people who have to worry about their chromosomes because of a complete fabrication.

Now

I'll

run through

briefly

some of

these other myths. There's


IF

a Tenth

Myth

that IT'S

ALL RIGHT
like

PERIMENT WITH DRUGS A


They're growing up,
lantic City so
let
it's

LITTLE,

COLLEGE KIDS EXTHAT'S NATURAL.


menaces here

going off to the whorehouse in Attheir fun, that the real

them have
is

are the dealers.

Well, the
if

medium
television

the message, and

will predict flatly that

we have

hedonic youth of the television waves of


roll

the future

the great heroes, the mythic heroes of our times are

going to be the rock and


dealer contingent
is frail
is

musicians and the dealers.


I

see the

well-represented.
lot of

know

that

human

nature

and that there are a

an economic society like transactions with drugs although increasingly less with LSD but still I would say that all of the economic groups who are out

unloving things that happen in our own. And money is involved in many

making money in this country, the holiest I know, and I've met and talked to many of them, are dealers. This was taught out in the Catholic Church which is a very very sophisticated psychedelic organization. The Catholic Church
had a big heresy controversy. They
said that the holy host, the sacrament of the Catholic Church, once it was consecrated, is supposed to be the body and blood of God. Now if that host is
is a sinner, who has taken money And the answer came down: "Yes, medium is the message." And the

given to you by a priest who on the side, does it still work?

you've got to believe that the

149

TIMOTHY LEARY
message can pass through the hands of CBS or NBC or ABC and the soap salesmen but still it's happening and it's happening in an electronic flashing way. I believe another group that's very misunderstood are the rock and
having a
festival
roll

and they brought


if

promoters. Well, you say, they're in all these rock and roll bands
lot of

and 50,000 kids came out but somebody made a


it. It's

money on
their

unfortunate

that happens but

still

50,000 kids had

conditioning and their reflexes and their reward and punishment

system shaken up a

little

by the Rolling Stones.

Now another myth, the Eleventh Myth: PSYCHEDELIC DRUGS MAY BE OKAY FOR RESPONSIBLE ADULTS BUT CERTAINLY NOT FOR YOUNG PEOPLE.
Of
course,
it's

a biological fact that

young people

are closer to

the divine process than old people, closer to their bodies, to their code and the whole thing. The whole revsenses, to their

DNA

happening today, comes from exactly the people that supposedly are not ready or mature or serious enough to discover heaven on earth.
olution, everything that
is

The

final

myth

is

that

THE

HIPPIE

MOVEMENT IS

OVER.

Movement is defined by Time Magazine, bonded by Haight-Ashbury, the Park. Yeah, it's mysterious and miraculous. The divine process sweeps through the world and
the Hippie

Of course,

You know, the divine process, she the Mississippi a hundred years ago and they are going round with the sailboats and the legends hoping she'll come
maybe through
swept
the galaxy.

down

back. She hit Haight-Ashbury, baby, and she there and she went on. And, of course, there

left

her message
in
left

was no LSD

Haight-Ashbury through
for the country.

all

of the time.

Most
It is

of the people

But what

is

happening

is

far

from dead.

an

invisible spir-

150

The Berkeley Lectures


upheaval and it's operating in myriad forms and duced today's topic.
itual

it

has pro-

Now I want to talk to you tonight about psychedelic psychology.


I wonder what defines psychedelic psychology. Psychedelic psychology is the study of pleasure. By pleasure I mean the unconditioned state, the state where you're beyond rewards and punishments that are laid on you socially. In others

In the beginning,

words, psychedelic psychology is how to turn on. It's how to reach the unconditioned state and how to preserve it, and it's

about the relationship between the unconditioned and the conditioned state of mind.

Turned on, of course, means to turn off your social conditioning reward and punishment, and let the older energies inside your

body take
the

over.

Now we

deal here, in the hedonic gap, with

think not only

most important but perhaps the only issue. The hedonic gap divides human beings or divides one part of our self from each
other.
It's

the issue.

And

it

can be conflict or

it

can be a harmo-

nious dialogue between that part of us or those among us who want to have everything controlled according to the current social
ideas of right

and wrong, and those who want things to be


is

free

and

natural.

Technically, this

the social conditioned state versus the un-

conditioned
nious union

state.
is

This particular dialogue or conflict or harmo-

defined in

many ways

as the responsible versus the


it's

creative. It's the uptight versus the turned on,

the correct ver-

sus the free,


flict,

it's

the Christian versus the non-Christian. This con-

One

of course, goes on inside of us as a psychological conflict. part of us has been socially conditioned to want to do ouris,

no matter how painful it der tight control. Another part of us


selves dirty,

knows

and keep everything unthat we've got two


and knows

billion years of ticker-tape instructions inside of us,

151

TIMOTHY LEARY
that
it's

really

supposed to happen naturally. That's psychological

conflict.
It happens every second of your life and mine, and in every encounter w^ith someone else. Usually w^e try to make them feel a little

better or bring
It's

encounter.
level,

them dov^n a little. That's called the hedonic more important than economics. At the political I'm audacious enough to believe that's the basis of the whole

thing. Certain social groups don't like the fact that other social groups are having more fun or are closer to God or closer to

nature or closer to their bodies.

Now^
so

fifty

much

years ago, maybe even tw^enty years ago, there was anti-Semitism in this country. I think that much of it was
fact that the Gentile

Jewish people were having more fun. They were spending their money instead of worrying about it and they were more involved in sensual experiences

due to the

was

just sure that the

and

aesthetic experiences and, unfortunately, the

Jewish people are getting more and more Protestantized. A new scapegoat has had to come along. I read Eldridge Cleaver and it's
clear to

me that what he says: It's partly envy Whitey just don't know how to do it anymore, so he controls others with guns and
handcuffs and so forth. The hippies and the longhairs are another

new scapegoat. The fact is that I wired this back to our planet: It's still illegal down here to look as if you're having too much fun. It's still more respectable to be sick than well and if you just laugh too much
you're really going to get them after you.

Now

the key term

is

conditioning.

And

to understand the he-

donic gap, beloved students, you must be aware of the mantra.

Eldridge Cleaver: Minister of Information for the Black Panther Party, Pres-

and author of the best-selling Soul on Ice, Cleaver gave Rosemary and Timothy Leary in the Black Panther's Algerian government-in-exile. Rosemary and Timothy were betrayed by Cleaver and held as his captives. They escaped to Switzerland.
idential candidate,

refuge to

152

The Berkeley Lectures

Now you all know what conditioning you through the Pavlovian trips very briefly because it's very relevant to what's happening with each and every one of us today. The Pavlov conditioning trip has cast two main
of this
is.

word

conditioning.

I'd like to take

characters. There

is I.

P. Pavlov.

won

the

Nobel
I

Prize 1904.
in
it

gig because
for the
is

was

here

He was born in 1849, died 1936, He was a physiologist. I know that in California. You just nominate me

Nobel

Prize.

the rat.

Now

I'm on the

all

do
I

it

together,

The other important participant in this drama rat's side. I want us both to live, let's I but got to be on the rat's side in this particular
all

case.

think that Pavlov had a great deal to learn from this par-

ticular rat
I

and we

mean, the way


I

have a great deal to learn from the rat. people say "rat, rat." It's a pretty bad thing
to call your attention to the fact that a

to be, a rat.

want you

recent ecologist pointed out that the

human

race
is

homicidal and
destroying every

every kind of 'cidal in

its

murderous rage

form of animal

life

on

this planet. In like

won't be any mammal species left that were prepared for the supermarket plastic-wrapped. And the only animal that will be around is the rat. Now that's really fantastic.

15 or 20 years there domesticated animals except

How

does the rat do

it?

He must

be smarter than

we

are.

We know
than any

that rats have been around a long, long time

more

human

being.

And

we're told that the rat

is

so hip to

the energy system, he'll be around long after we're gone.

Then, of course, we think


be dirty

rats are dirty.

Well

how

can the rat

when

the rat
dirt,

was here

millions of years before

man?

Who

brought the wasn't dirt.

anyway? Before
this rat,

man came

along there just

So anyway, we've got

you know

he's like

you or

I,

he's

I.

P. Pavlov:

Nobel

Prize w^inning Russian physiologist Ivan Petrovich Pavlov

coined the term "conditioned" to describe acquired reflexes observed in the studies of circulatory, digestive, and nervous systems of dogs. His findings
led to the foundation of behavioral psychology.

153

TIMOTHY LEARY
doing his thing and he's got his wife and his kiddies and he's working. Probably the rat thing is not all gravy. You know,
there's foxes

touch, he's really in touch

and the climate's changing and so forth, but he's in and everything is on that expectancy

computer and he smells and he sniffs and he can feel the earth in the spring and he knows when it's time to get up and he can triple-think the approach of a hawk and, boy, he's really an exmachine, he's doing fine. One day he's wandering around looking for some food for his wife and the kiddies and he smells
quisite

something extremely delicious. And he runs over and it's what we call cheese and he runs up to it and then wham, a big cage comes

down

over him. He's busted, man.


see, this is the part

Now
books,

they don't

tell

you

in the

psychology
course

when

they

tell

you about conditioning

rats. In the

of time, he's brought to the Pavlov laboratory, and after


three days they just keep
his wife

two or
about
pretty

and

kiddies:

him in there and he Did they have enough

gets worried

to eat?

And

soon he had to worry about himself: Will he have enough to eat? And who were these strange people, anyway? Now what does the rat want? Does he want what you and me want? He wants out

and back to

his nest, right?

He wants
three days,

to get out of that university

laboratory. So after

is hungry enough, an interesting thing happens to the rat. There's an enormous clang of a bell and suddenly right in front of him was a delicious piece

two or

when he

of cheese. Groovy. He says, "That was delicious, man, but it wasn't very much." Well, another half-hour, bang, another piece of cheese. Well, you know what happened. That's called primary

enough trials it got so that Pavlov could just do the bang and the rat would salivate and get all ready for the hunger. Now you see, God and the DNA code have worked for
conditioning. After

two billion years to design this rat perfectly to salivate when there was something real to eat not to salivate when Ivan Pavlov wanted him to salivate. Because Pavlov had perceptually copped
the rat's mind.

154

The Berkeley Lectures


Then, secondary conditioning's even worse. Then they got on and they'd ring the bell and then they'd show a light and then
light. If

it

he'd begin salivating for the

you're a rat and you're just

under the

illusion that you're

going to get your kicks

from

bells

and

lights, you're going to be a mighty thin rat.

Now in

the next
it's

series of

experiments, they've got the rats lying around and

weird thing but, you know, when you're


there's the

in that situation, well

gun and he's got the food, and you've got to play the game. You're looking, though, always, for
he's got the

man and

escape.

And
maze,
little

this alleyway,

then one day the cage door opened and he ran down this and he looked to the left and there was a

jumped over there and, wow, there's an electric grid. Mmm! Phew! He looked around and there's another maze over there and it's a delicious
smell

thing painted red and freedom, maybe, and he

and he crawls up to
as they got

it.

Yeah,

it's all

right: a beautiful piece

of cheese painted red, white, and blue.

He

begins to get the point.

As long

you

in their cage,

you got to play the game


let's

of reward and punishment.

Or to bring it a little closer to home, wife in the Berkeley Hills and she's got
so

say there's a house-

it all set,

baby. She's got


all

many

bells

and buzzers

in that

house that she can salivate


it's

day. Matter of fact, she only

knows

time to eat

when

the

buzzer goes off, the electric range goes zip, and the doorbell rings, and her husband's there, and the electric guard in the garbage
goes up, and
it's all fine.

She's there one

morning and everything's


it's

great. She's got

all

of the machines going and

not quite time

to eat yet. Suddenly, she looks out the


the

window

and, God, there's

most horrible

thing. There's her three- or four-year-old child

out there, playing on the front lawn, naked. Well, she puts all of her things on auto-computer hold and rushes out to the lawn and says, "What are you doing? What are you a sexual pervert.^ Want
to get your father fired

from

his job at the university?

Want

to

grow up

to be a prostitute?" Slap, bang, slap!

155

TIMOTHY LEARY
been through that time and time and time again. We if we hadn't. We'd be on some beach someplace without our clothes on. I know there's a door here someplace we

We've

all

wouldn't be here

can

all

get out

when

we're ready.

The

child says, "Mother, what's


it

wrong?

It

was
off.

the

first

day of
so

spring and

good out and then

to feel

was so sunny I took my shoes the earth, and I could almost feel
I

Gee,

it felt

the energy
I

coming
feel

took

my

shirt off and,


it

you know,
right."

could

the

breeze and so forth and

just

seemed

"Right? That's wrong!"

Yeah, that's wrong,

right.

Then what's

right?
is

Well, to slap a naked child


builds up. We're
all in

right, right? See, that's

how

it

that air conditioned rat maze.

We

have

been convinced because the

way
stay

the system

works
those.

is:

maneuver
to

around

here, if you're
If

good

away from

You have

keep checking.

you're just so alert to the rewards and punish-

ment some day you too can get to have your finger on the button of the electric grid. The message of this society is that the sensible

man

is the one who's got the power over the people. He's got the boots or he's got the handcuffs or he's got the guns or he's got the atomic bombs or he's got the sheriff behind him or whatever. Uh huh. I just gotta say that the power control trip is a bummer. It's a bummer. Because you can never win because you can control and you can bust them and you can line them up and you can make them have ID cards and draft cards and you can keep them, but you've got to keep them every minute in that cage where you control the food and the reward because if they escape for a min-

ute ..

You know,

they've got to keep that system going, so

now

they have compulsory education, and then you get the draft going, and economics and so forth. You've got to have that power over their bellies so they can't go to the supermarket, right. But it's no

156

The Berkeley Lectures


fun because you know that that rat is just waiting to head for home. There's no pleasure in control because in control you can
never
let

go. You've got to keep

it

going

all

of the time.

And

there

are other ones wanting to control, wanting to get their finger

on

your button, because they want to be

full

professor, too. That's

why
with

over me.

they get ulcers. It's that pyramid of who's got the button It's all a system of everyone conditioning everyone else,

fear.

Sometimes, when I talk about pleasure people don't know what to think. If you've never been very high your concept of pleasure
is

reward or the avoidance of pain,

like a bigger car or,

"Wow,

we've got a good police force in our town. Yea, I got a raise, yea, I got a mistress and I sleep with my secretary, too, yeah, right.

And

not only subscribe to


all

they advertise, yea, reward. That's the secondary or the tertiary or the quaternary conditioned sense. It has very little to do with what God worked
for

magazine, I buy everything right." Baby, that's not pleasure. That's

my own

two

billion years to
is

make: the divine human

situation.
is

Well, the pleasure

the unconditioned state. Pleasure

the

experience of being high. There's a range.

The
the

fascinating thing

about

it is

that

when you

think about

it

human

systems of

reward and punishment that are laid down to us in America are really very unimaginative and rather limited. What are the range
of mythic roles you can play here.^ What Well you have channel 7 and channel
is

the range of pleasure?

8, right?

We

are

all

moving

in, as

you

all

know,

to a

new

era.

And

here

I'm very indebted to Professor Herbert Marcuse of San Diego. Eros and Civilization is really a powerful statement in very scholarly terms.

The pleasure revolution


like

out that the old theory

going on. Marcuse points the Freudian theory was that there
is

was the reality and there was pleasure. Isn't that weird? Reality and pleasure as though pleasure is not real. Of course, what Freud meant by reality was work. Because of economic scarcity

157

TIMOTHY LEARY
you had to work.
sically erotic

We

were here to have pleasure and we're bato turn


it all

but

we have
it.

off because

we

can't afford

to turn

it

on and do

Well, that's

We've got to work. done. The modern technology and the

electric psy-

chedelic business has just

made

that an evolutionary step behind.

The

interesting thing was, of course, that conditioning only


in those terms a

was

known about
in the last

hundred years ago.

It

has only been

one hundred years that we've had a society which is completely conditioned, three and four and five times away from
It's as though the curse of conditioning of nervous systems that has gone on for millions of years this way has zipped up to us in the last one hundred years. This anthill, this

the original kick.

rat race that we're in

is

very new.

A hundred years ago the average

person was much closer to nature, much closer to the rhythms of the seasons, and he got his fingers into Mother Nature's bosom and he was much less conditioned than he is now with today's
proliferation of conditions

The pendulum
this

is

upon conditions upon conditions. swinging back and what we're all involved

in

room

is

a very exciting period in history

when

a social

pendulum which was swung one way

for hundreds

pendulum, and

thousands of years, begins to swing back. That's a very exciting time because it's going faster when it's just coming down. Or it

seems the decline or the going up seems more accelerated. We are all riding the exultant tide of maybe three or four thousand years
of repression which culminated in the mechanical society that's

running Washington today. And it's thrilling but it's somewhat risky. Yeah. But it's a very exciting place to be and I know you

can

all feel

that energy just building

up around

us.

There are certain practical things that we should know about these historical and evolutional events, to have more fun and apgoing to be a big change in lifetalks about the society of play styles happening already. and display. It's all going to be an erotic beauty trip, but, of course, this is not the way it is today. The models that are held
preciate
it

more

clearly. There's

Marcuse

158

The Berkeley Lectures


to

up

psychologists, are chosen, of course, because they represent the virtues of the

young people today, by the educators and the

conditioned reward-punishment system aimed at making man so that he comes closer and closer to being a machine. The good,
successful

man is

know

the theory:

dependable, he's reliable, easily replaceable. You If you want to be an educator, or a college

professor, or a psychiatrist, or get into the policy-making business

you have to look worried. You cannot betray a twitch or muscle that you could possibly have an ecstatic thought inside. Your average liberal person
tical
is

genially cynical

and kind of mellowly skep-

but he's rational, he's rational, he's rational.


in the repressive society

And

to hold

any position
If there's

anyone who be turned on and seems to radiate too much

you have to be very serious. walks around smiling a lot and seems to
love, or

worse

yet,

if

there's a doctor or a psychiatrist or a teacher

who

raises the

hedonic

level of his students or patients, creates pleasure

around

him, you know, he's really in trouble.

And

it's

always been that

way. At the end of a time


getting to
its

like this,

when

the repressive

pendulum

is

the rat

maze

peak, anyone is not where

who
it's

goes around saying, "Come on, at, you know, we're here, we're

good, pleasure, pleasure, pleasure!" if you say that, you're in trouble. Orpheus was one of the early mythic members of the trade union. Middle-aged Thracian women tore him to bits in
rage.

they were wearing tennis shoes but I do know that Dionysus never got tenure and Wilhelm Reich died in jail and Crowley and on and on. It's a risky business to a
I

don't

know whether

certain point but that's changing very rapidly

and

prediction to

you

that within ten or fifteen years,

make when

a slight the he-

donic society emerges, the very people today who are the most uptight and worried and serious and rational, the people playing
these roles in the future, will be the

most

ecstatic: the college

professor, the psychiatrist of the future, the politician, or anyone you're going to give power to. He's got to feel better than you,

159

TIMOTHY LEARY
right?

than you.

You're not going to give power to him if he's more uptight You will be able to tell the psychiatry professor at the

University of California in fifteen years because he radiates in

every pore that he's turned on.


to be a block

And

he. just

makes you

feel

good

away from him. The

fact that

he even does

this will

training, learning

be because he studied for ten years and four years of it was spent how to turn himself and turn other people on.

another important aspect of psychedelic psychology is diagnosis. You have to be able to diagnose yourself. That is you have to learn to detect where your hedonic index is. It's like a

Now

thermometer. At every point your certain scale is of being uptight or turned on and actually the only point in living is to try to raise
that index, and
it's

hedonic

level of those

very important to be able to diagnose the you deal with. There are certain laws of

hedonic interaction that can bring you down if you don't understand them, but if you understand them they can bring you and
the other person

up

to

where you want to

be. In order for

you to

perform a hedonic diagnosis we have developed a

series of levels

of consciousness, levels of ecstasy, or levels of pleasure, and I want to put these on the board in a rather didactic way and see

where they

lead.

7 Levels of Consciousness

Level Seven

is is

somnambulistic

sleep.
it's

Level Six

the level of emotional reaction,

all

you

feel:

rage, fear, anxiety.

Level Five

is

social conditioning, the social

game

that you're

taught in school. Level Four is the level of the senses.


Level Three Level
is

the somatic level of the body.


call the genetic level

Two

is

what we

of consciousness or

behavior.

160

The Berkeley Lectures


Level

One
is

is

electro-biological.

This

the hedonic index, the hedonic thermometer. Each of


is

brought about by biochemical changes in your body. When you go to sleep there are biochemical alterations caused by fatigue and you nod out. Not only are each
of these states brought about by inner biochemicals, they can also be produced exogenously, externally, by the proper hedonic drug.
If

these states of consciousness

you want to go to sleep and you're not fatigued or you've got Level Six emotions kicking around, or your Level Five social

reward-punishment head thoughts are keeping you awake, you can take a sleeping pill and nod out.
Level Six
is

worth commenting on

for a

moment. To the psyis

chedelic psychologist, emotions are very different than they were


to the old-fashioned psychologist.

Emotion

usually kind of roall,

mantically defended in the uptight society. After

the only kicks

you got was

rage.

To

the psychedelic psychologist emotions are

an emergency instrument for escape or for flight which are built into the system and are rarely to be used. There's no excuse:
You're a
little

need a
stupor.

lot of adrenaline to kick in.

angry because the bridge is falling down and you Emotions are a form of active
thought of
this

Now

see, the hippies

and before them

black

wisdom and brown wisdom taught

the uptight people running around

They saw all and getting angry and like,


us this.
be,

man, what's the problem? Emotions tend to

you know, put


is

down among
on

psychedelic circles. People say,

"Wow,

he laying

a heavy trip."

Emotions are

far

from being some prized the


is

way they are in psychoanalytic circles. Now, of course, love is not an emotion. Love
great internal energy

a feeling of
else

which you're sharing loving someone

and love runs through all these things. Emotions are conditioned. You are taught, you learn what to fear and what to hate and what to avoid and what to approach

The drug of choice

but emotions can be stirred up by the proper external chemicals. ... if you want to lower the hedonic index

161

TIMOTHY LEARY
and
raise the irritability

index then, of course, throw a cocktail

party.

Level Five

is

the social conditioning, rewards

and punishment,

rational mentation. If

you want

to speed that up, take speed or

coffee or chain smoke.

Level Four, the sensory level,


sition of

probably the basic center poany animal, including man, but which is now is almost
is

a rarity in people over

fifty.

The

central level of consciousness

is

being aware directly of the energies which are hitting your eyes, your ears, and not thinking about it but just becoming one with

them. This, of course,


point that

is

extremely pleasurable and

it's

at this

you where your orthodox psychology books won't tell you anything about it. Teach them rewards and punishment so that you can run a computer, or you can run a jet plane, or you can bomb, or whatever. You know, all psychology does is try to improve proit's

begin to get illegal

and

exactly at this point

ductivity

social conditioned

behavior

to reduce the untidy,

messy emotional perversions that develop with bad conditioning. Psychiatry and personality psychology deals with emotions and
there are hundreds of
ries
lists

and

classifications of the conditioned systems

and systems and mythological categoand emotional


and
all that.

conditions: aggression, rage, dependency, anal, oral,

Modern psychology concerns


Seven.

itself

with Levels Five,

Six,

and

Those of you who are


to
tell

really serious scholars of pleasure,

want

you
it's

that

it's

very easy.

Once you

get onto

this

hedonic

where somebody else is at, because we betray our hedonic index in every gesture and tone of voice and everything we do. And it's very important for you to
index,
really very easy to diagnose

able to recognize the hedonic level of

someone who

is

laying

something on you. To give you a poignant example of how to diagnose hedonic levels, let's take pro football, right? Every Sunday millions of Americans are watching pro football on television.

Now,

playing pro football

is

a high-level social conditioned sys-

162

The Berkeley Lectures


Boy, there are plenty of rewards and plenty of punishments. So the pro football player is highly conditioned. It's very easy to tell when he's doing something. Namath is going back to pass,
tern.

Jones

is

levels of

red-dogging. It's very easy, of course, to diagnose the emotion. You say, "Uh oh, what's going on here. Some

trouble.

Brown
is

is

slugging

Namath. He's

ejected

from the

field."

Emotion

conditioned behavior that doesn't

make

the fine dis-

criminations of the social game.

When you

get emotional you

don't care about who's winning. You just want to slug him and of course usually emotional behavior interferes with your Level

game sequence and is frowned upon. At least very easy to diagnose: Namath is knocked out.
Five

Level Seven

is

Look, diagnosing Level Four is looking down left field. Uh oh! What's happening down there? Joe Namath is nearly on the field and he's smiling and he seems to have a blade of grass in his
hand. What's Joe saying down there? He's saying, "It's beautiful." He must have been shaken up badly in the last play. You can
usually tell by posture, by gesture, by arrangement of the sensory equipment whether the person is in Level Four. He's turned off to social games for the moment and he's trying to magnify, intensify, focus

on the

direct sensory hit.


is

Level Three behavior

awareness of your body. For most


it's

Westerners

this

is

kind of a mystery but

well

known

that

Tantric and other well-known Oriental, Hindu, and Buddhist psychologists have developed ways of putting consciousness into the

body. They can control the voluntary ways of breathing, of heartbeat, of circulation, of direction and digestion, elimination, and so forth. They call them chakras and the important courses in the
future of psychedelic education will be courses in
these energies

how

to turn

on

from your

different nerve plexus,

your autonomic

nerve plexus, and how to direct them and how to be ecstatic. I don't know much about this but Hindu and Bengali and some of
the Buddhist tantrics say that your

body

is

just filled

with

all

these

organs and nerve

fibers, just

all

waiting to have orgasms.

Of

163

TIMOTHY LEARY
course they're just into the orgasms which sometimes in their descriptions make the simple Playboy genital acrobatics seem rather
coarse, but we'll
all

learn

more about

this together.
is

In any case, about somatic Level Three behavior, this

taboo.

is Everything about social taboo. You're just not supposed to show publicly that you're grooving behind sound. You're supposed to close the door and

conditioning, reward and punishment,

lie
it

down and when no


is

one's looking

you can, you know,

get into

with incense and so forth.

Too much

attention to the sensory

considered wrong. But certainly, if you were to betray in your behavior that you were having a somatic ecstasy you're just
detail

you know, appropriate. Someone is lying down in the street they're writhing around and you come in and you say, "Hey, what's going on around here?" Cop comes. They all say the person's suffering. Somatic impulses coming out, poor thing. What's
not,

and

going on here? He's writhing in pleasure. Call the cops. Lock him up. Taboo. Sensory behavior, somatic reward or ecstasy, including sexual, has
all

been rather taboo until your generation.

Now Level Two genetic behavior, the genetic level of consciousness,


is

worth a few comments. I'm talking here about the expe-

rience that people have

when

the social conditioned robot that

they discover that they are not just went to Garfield High School
forth.

and the University of California and so


there are
all

They discover

that

sorts of personages, all sorts of ancestors, all sorts of

genetic combinations kicking


that are quite different.

around

inside of our consciousness

Most
if

and most of them are


punishment too.
personage
of course,
It

far

of them don't have short haircuts, removed from our current rewards and

It's

as

we

are being taken over by another

who
is

is

definitely not of this time.


is

Now this experience,


I

ancient and

very frequent.

was a kid, that the way they would always say someone was crazy was they'd show him going around with his hand in his shirt acting like Napoleon. Anytime anyone shows behavior which seems to be archaic or be
used to be in the comic books

when

164

The Berkeley Lectures


costuming or grooming or
suspect,
in gesture or in

historical in

words
usually

you begin to
diagnose

you

say, oh, he's crazy.

You can

this at the genetic level of consciousness.


It's

Now this used


and I'm

to be just an oddity.

well

known

that in the mental hospitals

there are people going around saying I'm Julius Caesar

Cleopatra.

Poor thing,

let's

get

him back

to being Joe Jones, right?

movement of the of has been this movement archaic, historical, proliferation Hippie and what I would call genetic behavior. When you go out to dance at the Fillmore or the Avalon, it boggles the mind to see
See the interesting thing about the psychedelic
the historic
for

and genetic types that are walking around. Especially someone who grew up as I did in the '30s and '40s when

everyone looked alike and made the same robotic motions. You go over there and you see people in Hindu costumes and Victorian
naval uniforms, gay '90s, not to mention peasant women from every culture in world history. This is just not a fad because as

people begin to turn on, begin to peel off your emotional conditioning, suspend your emotional conditioning so you're no longer afraid, you begin to disconnect the reward-punishment social systems, and that's
all

turning on

is.

Your

senses begin to unfold,


see that

you begin seething with energy, and you begin to

you

have a genetic personality, you have a racial personality. I'm quite rigorous, I would almost say scientific in my definition
of this thing. I'm talking about what Jung talked about
talked about racial unconscious.
I

when he

DNA Watson two up very carefully, but as I see the game of the DNA code, Rosemary and our friends spent a lot of time trying to unravel and decipher that Rosetta Stone in our laboratory: open air
around
after

Carl Jung had been and Crick discovered he would have


think
if

tied the

high in a mountain. Because we live in a social situation, what the

DNA code

does

with a primate species


genetic types.

like

ours

is

a statistical
is

game

of these basic

The

first

typing, of course,

male/female. In order

165

TIMOTHY LEARY
game going you have to make sure that you get roughly 50-50 there but then within the male group there are these different karmic thoughts so you give this one bigger musto keep the
cles

and a

faster trigger
fast

machine-gun
a
little

like adrenaline

system so he

can move

and

he's going to be the v^arrior, right?

And

this

one, we'll tone

him down

and make him and


he'll

tall

but go

way

down

in the adrenaline, a little thinner,

be the teacher.

We've got the priest and the fool and the homosexual and the plower and the peasant and so forth. The DNA code is spinning
and very often the Level Five or the Level Six had has absolutely nothing to do with what the personality in mind when they stamped you on the great cosmic Detroit Asthese things out

DNA

sembly Line and sent you here. I'm talking about a genetic

conflict or a biological conflict

within the person. Suppose there's a young boy whose design


just tell by looking at his body and also by watching him code had him in mind out playing in the playground his as a warrior: trigger-fast reactions and quick to alarm and quick

you can

DNA

and he got the muscles to go with it but unfortunately he has a Jewish mother. So she's got him off the playground at the age of four and playing violin, right? Well at the age of 10,
to anger

15,

20 or 30,

he's got

one personality.

He may

be head of the

music department at California, but somewhere underneath there, and he's mad about it but can't do anything about it except maybe
break a violin
string.

Somewhere underneath
it

it all

there

is

this

warrior-type and of course

goes the other


little

way

around.

You

have a

lot of occult,

shaman-type

boys being forced into

Junior League Football by their parents. Now most people, of course, never know what their genetic type is. You just run in the

maze, go

left

piece of cheese, "thanks a

here and go three rights, yeah and then you get a lot, oh, income tax, yeah." And, of

course, our controlled, repressive, mechanical, technological sys-

tem

is

to be the same.

so set up that you're teaching kids in school to be the same, You want every engineer to be the same, you

166

The Berkeley Lectures


want every doctor to diagnose right and they've all got to be the same w^ith no regard to the fact that at any playschool nursery you have maybe twelve or fifteen or one hundred different genetic
types there.

Now^, the only


genetic type
to help
is, is

way

that

you can discover, of course, what your

consult a Jungian analyst and they might be able


they're the only analysts that are ever con-

you because
Five,

cerned with this at


Six

all.

Of course,

the other

and Level

groove

at Level

way is to unplug Level Four for awhile and then go

on. Pretty soon

you

will get

some intonations of your own imdestiny.

mortality and of your

own karmic

Now an interesting thing has happened, you see, that in the last
or seven or eight years in this country more and more people have been conditioning themselves voluntarily. That's called the
five

psychedelic drug movement. There

people
alities

who
are

are beginning to

you have literally millions of discover what their genetic person-

and they are scrapping their socially-conditioned perThat's what we mean by drop out. By turn on we mean sonality. decondition yourself, by drop out we mean disconnect the compulsory reward-punishment systems and do your basic seed thing. And, of course, one of the by-products of the psychedelic expression
is

this proliferation of historical types.

young people today and you're


It

just struck by the fact that

You walk among wow!


historical areas

could be

like a city

block in India where you see people of

different castes

and

different historical regions


just

and

and so forth and

it's

an incredible

variety. In our kindergarten

if any kid begins to show signs of a genetic type that isn't in the primary school manual, all the pressure of

and grammar school,

rewards and punishment are put on the kid to cut

it

out.

We
ical

are seeing this effervescence of individual dress

and

histor-

archaic behavior which delights me and I think this is going to be one of the major occupations of the hedonic society in the
future: Finding out

who you
and

are supposed to be

and then

living

that out with exquisite

aesthetic detail.

167

TIMOTHY LEARY
I

do think

it's

very important in these days of conflict and

strife

between and among people and groups to get this concept: the hedonic gap. The hedonic gap, the h.g., is going on all the time. It's much more important than the economic gap. It's much more
important than whether this one has got more status or power because power ain't where it's at. At every second in your life,
everyone you meet is either getting higher or bringing the other person up or bringing the other person down. And it's very important to recognize what the encounter is that you are involved in so that you will not be brought down but can bring the other

person up.

many human situations we're both at the same hedonic level. And it's let's say you and your wife. You're up here on the top and she's alongside here, all right? You and she are both asleep that's 7/7. Never knew science could be so much

You

see, in

fun, did you? But


sually

if

and

she's asleep that's 4/7, or

you're at Level Four, you're turned on senif she's turned on sensually

and you're asleep that's 7/4. Now, see 5/5 is where we're both playing the husband and wife game. You're worried about the
budget.

The

first

thing you have to do

is,

make

new

marital

diagnosis because terrible misunderstandings occur if you're turned on sensually and she's chatting about the budget, that's 4/ 5. If you're turned on very erotically, fanatically, and she's angry

because you were late coming home that's 3/6 trouble. Now with an audience of this sophistication and intelligence I need not
belabor
this. I

urge you to commit

it

to

memory and

see

if it

works.
I

will point out certain

laws or truths, the four noble truths of


the hedonic gap between

the hedonic gap.

Noble Truth Number One:


the other person
is

If

you and

lower

is

going to pull

not recognized, inevitably the person who is down the other person to the lower level.
very angry.
6.

You

see,

someone

is

him. You're 5 and she's

along to reason with Well, you just can't reason with some-

You come

168

The Berkeley Lectures


their adrenaUne is pumping and you say the rewards no longer work. Eventually they are going to pull you down, you're going to get exasperated. You're down and that's called 616, not recis

one

who
it's

very angry.

You know,

and

a rage-flight thing

ommended.

How

can you prevent

this

law of

inertia, of entropy,

or Freud-

ian pessimistic equilibrium, with everyone

bringing everyone

down? The guy with the gun can bring down the other person. The hippie is playing his flute and the cop comes along. You know
the cop
the law,
Five,
is

a Level Five

and wants to be reasonable and

he's got

and eventually the hippie is going to be down conditioned rewards and punishment.
and
is

to Level

Children

that's the great battleground or counterfield of

the hedonic gap. That, baby,


that's

the primary school. That's

all

going on in

first

grade. You've got a roomful of 30 wiggling,

sexy, erotic, somatic, genetic-type kids. And they just want to do the whole thing and play out their genetic roles and this and that

and running and nursing and playing doctor. And you've got a school teacher who is paid by society to lay the Level Five trip on them.
Level

One

is

electro-biochemical.

It is

well

known
is

that there
just

are certain times

when

the

human nervous

system

taken

over by a wave-like almost electrical type phenomenon, an epileptic seizure, for example, or an electric shock, which is given in
therapy, or reports from visionaries and certain explorers who report that at high moments of ecstasy everything is just a vibration. There's

no more

genetic code, there's nothing but just pure

light or pure plus and minus charge. What is the school teacher's hedonic profile? In the future, there's going to be one reason for any scientific product and that
is

some hope of discovering something

that will

make people

feel

better, so that the diagnostician, the personality psychiatrist, in

the future will be mainly concerned with your hedonic level.

When you

go to a psychiatrist

in the future he'll say, "Well, plug

169

TIMOTHY LEARY
and what's your hedonic level? Oh, your sensory level is way down, tsk, tsk. We have a little drug for you to take. And well, your genetic level too. We have no action there but we have a
it

in

much

better

drug for you to take there."


other people's.
it

And you

will be able to

profile

your own and


see,

You
levels.

gets kind of complicated even within

one of these

At Level Four, the sensory level, if you're going to know yourself and know who you are you have to know that each person has certain sensory equipment which are over-developed

you have thirty kids


trol,

even though in the classroom turned on in a sensory way and wiggling and the teacher comes in and the teacher, of course, has the con-

and certain ones that

aren't, so that

all

the punishment, including the Level Six anger thing. There's that amount of gap. But then among the kids themselves when

they go out on the playground and play you find a different kind of hedonic gap which is much less ominous because it leads to
interlevel

harmony and

that

is

that one kid likes to

move around

body and the other one likes to groove behind his eyes or ears If you get a girl who grooves behind touch and a boy who grooves behind looking, there's a hedonic gap there. She'll
his

or touch.

he doesn't

he's very agile in his kinesthetic equipment but touch or anything." Or she'll say, "Well, you may be a dancer but you ain't no lover," to paraphrase the Beatles' description of the Maharishi.
say, "Well,

maybe

like to

Now, how do you lower the hedonic gap? This is a crucial issue and until we learn how to understand and to lessen the hedonic
gap that comes between people there's just going to be nothing but bloodshed and war and uptight trips.

Noble Truth Number One: Unless


level tends to

it's

recognized, the hedonic

plummet. The uptight person can bring down the

turned-on person. But Noble Truth


nized

Number Two:

If

the hedonic gap


it

is

recog-

and you've got to be able to

see

in yourself

and others

then the hedonic gap can be closed by the appropriate reward.

170

The Berkeley Lectures


here comes the

Now,
priate

skill.

You have
if

to

know what

the appro-

reward

is. If

someone has gone

into a rage,

you stop being poverty funds to the ghetto, okay? It just doesn't work. You can't reason with someone who is in a rage or in a terror. You have to pick out the exact, specific reward that will reduce the fear.
say, well,

with them.

You

mad

you can't reason I'll give more

You can
To
if

only bring someone else up higher by reducing the fear

at the level they're trapped at.

give

you an example of how


is

this thing

works

at all levels,

someone

trapped at the sensory level


to just

and you want them up

higher,

you have

reward that particular sensory thing. You


to another level.

just can't haul

somebody up or down

To show

you how
cific,

this explicit recognition of the hedonic gap and the spe-

precise, aesthetically accurate

situation

now between
all

the black

reward would work, take the community and the police and
there's a

the uptight white community.

Now,

tremendous amount
are afraid

of fear in

three of these groups.

The black people

because they think they're living in a colonial situation where the white policemen come in and take their rights away. The white

middle class or lower middle class guy that's finally got his little house, he's worried because the blacks are going to take it, there's
going to be a riot and he's
are in the
all

uptight.

And

of course the police

most

difficult position

of

all.

They're uptight because

they have to patrol a conquered territory. You couldn't have chosen a better situation to lower the whole hedonic level.

The

solution to this

is

so simple according to the principles of

You have to reward everybody. You cannot reward the blacks because then the whites will get more upset.
psychedelic psychology.
Precisely, the

reward there would be to take

all

the white police

out of the black ghetto and put them in the white neighborhoods so that every white neighborhood has two cops at every corner. Then have the black police take care of their blocks. Then the
white people aren't

mad and
them

upset because they're surrounded by


lollipops

people that are giving

and are giving them beers

171

TIMOTHY LEARY
and you know, that's great. The uptight white neighborhood is no longer uptight because they got a ring of police and the black

community can do

its

thing and do and take us


is

all

brother. Well, again, this audience

so intelligent that

with you, black I won't

with

belabor the techniques of recognizing the hedonic gap and dealing it in correct ways. The wrong reward is no more than useless.

Another Truth about the hedonic gap is that you can't jump levels, I don't think. Or maybe you can jump very quickly but if
very angry at Level Six, the reward's got to be at that level or if you bring him up to a level higher it's going to be
the person
is

really

unusual and then you can get him to turn on more. But
is

if

you Four massage or bring them a Level Four flower or you'll get hit over the head. This thing seems to operate in a very precise way you just move from level to level and this, as I said, will be the main occupation of the hedonic society of the future the
that

someone

at Level Six in a rage,

can't give

them a Level

ranging of the hedonic index, the harmonizing of hedonic gaps. It's now we return, of course, to the differences between people,
to the unitarian, liberal socialist left-wing person,
is

when everyone

the

same we're

all

going to have equality together. Well, the

notion of differences seem upsetting but actually, to the psychedelic psychologist, all these differences that exist among us be-

come

these beautiful opportunities for mutual teaching.

You teach

me, you teach Rosemary, your hedonic discoveries and we'll share ours with you and the differences instead of leading to conflict

and increasing the hedonic gap, beauty, union, and communion.

will lead to a proliferation of

172

The Psychedelic Marriage

TO TUNE
pleasure.

IN.

How We have discussed psychedelic psychology


The study of
the unconditioned state

the study of
relation-

and the

ship of the pleasurable or unconditioned state to the conditioned. Now, we define pleasure as the nervous system freed from the

reward and punishment and associations of social conditioning. I spoke about the hedonic age which is now well upon us and blosour future: the age of play and display, in which the only point of human life will be the finding of what we're here

soming
to seek

in

the state of radiant, loving Bliss.

I want to repeat a warning which I have made in the past: There's no dogmatic stuff being laid out, just our trip, Rosemary's

and mine, and our brothers' and sisters'. We're not explaining, we're exploring, sharing some of the notions that have occurred
to us.
I

really

have to underscore

this

warning when I'm talking

about something as elusive as the sexual relationship and particularly speaking from the male point of view. Not to mention the
fact that I'm a Libra,

The

fact to

and you know how Librans like balance. remember about the psychedelic marriage, is this:

Psychedelic drugs push you through the hedonic barrier, they turn

on your body. Psychedelic drugs turn on somatic and sensory and genetic and vibratory energy.
If

you are going

to use psychedelic drugs, particularly strong

173

TIMOTHY LEARY
psychedelic drugs (such as
useful to

LSD and mescaUne) you


member

will find

it

work out
is

a system of Tantric worship to harness these

physical energies in union with a

of the opposite sex.

no hedonic compulsion here. You don't have to take psychedelic drugs. As a matter of fact, I would speculate that
there

Now

perhaps there are fifty percent of the people on this planet who are not karmically designed for the psychedelic yoga, the yoga of
turning on the energies in your body and then learning hook these up in helical union.
Psychedelic drugs
Erotic? Eros, Love.

how

to

do turn on

erotic energy.

What do To

mean by

They turn on

the physical lovemaking equip-

ment

not just genital but cellular and sensory.

us Eros means

God. God, Love, Eros. God, Love, Eros. Religion means Eros, Love.
Psychedelic drugs are aphrodisiacs.

When

I first

made

this

ob-

servation in that venerable scientific publication. Playboy


zine,

maga-

many

leading psychedelic scientists rose up in alarm and


lie."

outrage, and said "That's an absolute

There's a psychedelic researcher in the East

who had
said, "I

written a

book on
there

the psychedelic experience,


five

and she

have wit-

nessed over

hundred ingestions of psychedelic drugs, and

was not one erotic experience in my presence!" Not to mention psychiatrists who had given LSD in mental hospitals. They had absolute proof that LSD was no an erotic
instrument.

used the term aphrodisiac in the Playboy interview to refer to Aphrodite, goddess of Love. The effect of psychedelic drugs is to
I

turn on corporeal energies, not necessarily and automatically for good, because if there's anything that is ominous and destructive,

and

really fearful in

human

existence,

it's

powerful and erotic

energies which are distorted, twisted, misunderstood. Most of our confusion and aggression, of course, comes from those energies.
I

erotic love: turning

simply point out that psychedelic drugs do pose the problem of it on or turning it off illustrating the problem
spiritual sex.

between mechanical and

174

The Berkeley Lectures


Playboy magazine sent a reporter up to Millbrook. Now, if it had been Sports Illustrated, I would have talked about mechanical

and

spiritual athletics.

"Do you

think marijuana helps athletes?"

they might have asked. I would have replied, "Well,

it

depends on which sports you

which psychedelic drugs kind, sports which involve flow, immediacy, sensory intensification, and harmony with energies greater than yourself, sure." Take the United States Ski Team. Turn them
to play, but there are certain sports
will help.

want

The non-aggression

on! Certainly the United States Surfing Team.

And probably
uh-uh.
is

the

Tennis

Team would

benefit.

But Pro Football

Psychedelic drugs turn


true, tion,

on physical energy. This

absolutely

whether for good or for bad or for construction or destrucfor God or the Devil. I remember reading about the case of

the 16-year-old girl

who had

a nightclub, and

it

been unwittingly dosed with LSD in took ten deputy sheriffs to hold her down.
all

Well,
the

mean,

that's a very unfortunate illustration of the fact that

human body

has

sorts of energy resources available

and

that strong energies get tapped during a psychedelic experience.


So, you turn on and enhance your senses and you become one with your chakras and your somatic organs and your circulation

racial history

and you spin down through your DNA ladders of genetic and and reincarnate in all these different forms, and
if

perhaps,

you're lucky, you reach the

moment

of highest

illu-

mination where everything becomes a magnetized dance of vibrations and then what? And then you come down, right?
. . .

Consider

this situation in

terms of a hedonic index.


It's like

think of

the hedonic index a continual ticker tape.

a cardiogram.

You can

plug yourself in and get a reading of what's happening. You're getting hedonic tape all the time, and you're fluctuating

up and down.
average beer-drinking American: Mainly sleep, social conditioning, and sullen senses. He does have moments of the sensory hit: That is,
Let's look at the daily

hedonic fluctuation

level of the

175

TIMOTHY LEARY
shaving lotion in the morning. And he enjoys getting a haircut because he digs the massage on his head. Now, let's take someone who's been living this way but then

he

likes to smell the

takes LSD.
barrier.

We

And

have here a case of breaking through the hedonic the question is, what sort of rhythm do you need to

keep going? How do you enter and control the energies? Because once you have broken through the hedonic barrier, once you are aware of the fact that there is more besides reward and punish-

ment and sleep and dull pain, then the question is, how much sensory, and which sensory energies, and how much somatic, and which somatic energies. Then the real excitement and challenge of psychedelic psychology or the spiritual life begins to unfold. Which yogas, which
techniques
?

whom?
ligion?

Yes, above

When and how and basically with whom? With all, with whom? Who belongs to the new relow

When
hedonic

a culture gets over-conditioned and drifts along at


levels

then you get religions of pain and suffering. When a whole nation that's caught at the levels of reward you've got

and punishment, minor

irritation
it

value system that backs

and sleep, you've got to have a Therefore most of our Western up.

value systems and religions are suffering religions.


the

down

a virtue.

They glorify most Judeo-Christian systems, illness becomes Certainly the worried frown will get you ahead faster
trip.

In

than the broad grin.

We
watch

begin to worship

illness.

You know, Rosemary and

don't

television very often, but occasionally we're in a motel

on
the

the road
plane.

at Life magazine on amazing the number of ads for patent medicines and aspirins and three-way potions and two-way lotions you see and none of these drugs aim to make you feel good, just ease the
It's
little.

and we watch the tube or look

pain a

We've had some revelatory experiences recently about the illness trip that the world has been on this year. I think that if you
176

The Berkeley Lectures


were studying this planet from another planet you would be sending back messages that the human race just feels bad this winter.

You know,
dent.

there's the

Hong Kong

flu.

That came along about


presi-

October '68 when people were thinking about electing a


to die,

We had a third of the electorate so sick that they just wanted

and they said, "Yeah, man, let Nixon have it. He's suffermore than the other two candidates." If you're that sick, you don't want a smiling face around, do you? When the Nixon ading

ministration gets to Washington, immediately they

come down
White

with the Potomac

flu.
is

Hepatitis

is

pretty virulent in the


all

House. The cabinet

hanging around,

feeling

down. You

know,
"Yeah,

there's
let

no zest, and J. Edgar wants another forty-year term. him have it. Sure. Pass the three-way aspirin, Pat."

You know, if you study the political bulletins you'll realize that too many of the leaders of the world are operating out of hospital beds. Every now and then, they get Mao Tse-tung on his feet to
prove he's
alive. It

was an ominous precedent

in

Mr. Nixon's
had a

history that about fifteen years ago. President Eisenhower

heart attack and he ran the country better than ever from that

plush hospital in Colorado. FDR and JFK in wheelchairs! What's happening?! I think it's clear that civilized man, technological

man, urban man,


in tune
oil pollution,

is

just

not taking care of his body, and

is

not

with the rhythms of the body, and there's more smog and and Hong Kong flu. So, there'll be an intensification
religions.
is

of the

down

And

then,

you

get

God

the geriatric.

And

Christiaan Barnard

his prophet.

The down
Genesis,

trip, of course, has something to do with the

book of
of the

when Adam and Eve got busted and thrown out


for eating that illegal vegetable.
I

Garden

That Genesis

is

just

an

unfortunate sick joke.

would

like to scrap that

whole theory. As

Aquarian Age we've got to rewrite that Genesis: Eve gives Adam the apple. And he bites it. "Fantastic. Say! Where'd you get that?"
into the

we dance

"Here, honey, try

it!"

Adam

says.

177

TIMOTHY LEARY
She
tries
it.

"Yeah, incredible!"

"Hey, give

some

to the snake!"

"Yeah, right!"

Then they plant


hundred apple

the apple seeds

and the next year they have a

trees, and a hundred pear trees and all sorts of w^onderful vegetables grov^ing! Garden of Eden. Really. In the Hedonic Age the religious issue simply becomes a matter

Whose product is going to get you higher, faster, longer, cheaper? Now, v^e have this Meher Baba guru telling you about his ocean of bliss. And the Dick Alpert guru has the endless orgasm. And you get all these different cats and sects
of hedonic competition.
offering their brand of ecstasy. Right on!
I

v^as in

Kyoto once on one of

my

pilgrimages talking to a
that threw
in

Zen

master

who was

also a full professor

me

little

and he said to me, "You are interested


I

Tibetan Buddhism?"

said, "Yes."

"You've written a book about the psychology of the Tibetan Book of the Dead."
I

said,

"Yes."

He
is

said, "Well,

we

in

Japan think that our form of Buddhism

purer than that."

And I said, "Well, yeah, right on. Take me on your trip!" He said, "The Tibetans call their Void a White Light." And I said, "Yeah." "Well, we talk about Pure Void. How can the Void be white?" I said, "Well, professor, you've taught me a great deal." The other night, we saw some advertising of gurus at the door.
The were handing out
anyone
erature!
else that

handbills about their ecstasies. Great! I'm

in favor of competition,

and

welcome

the

Meher

Baba-ites or

wants to come up here and rap or pass out litRemember, I'm not involved, Rosemary and our brothers

and

not involved in the guru game at all. It's just not our karma to run that avatar-supreme master-perfect illuminated
sisters are

state-guru number.

178

The Berkeley Lectures


recognize there are such people and that perhaps for cent of the population, that's the trip.
I

fifty

per-

we

There's no competition here between any of these paths because are all going to get to the same place, and we know that there

are different directions.


directions

and

we'll

Oddly enough, we can go exactly opposite probably end up there at the same time if we
if

follow our karmic map,


instructions.
If

we

follow our genetic

DNA ticker-tape
bliss

any guru, or any technique can get you to the ocean of

at the rate that

you want

to

go

there,

There
things

is

an

interesting, technical question

go baby! about rhythm. These

do go in rhythms. Like anything else in life there are ups and downs, and the particular timing of your rhythm, the height, the depths, and so forth, that's the name of the game.
There are some people

who

say that you can get to Level One,

which
there

is

just the pure void ocean of bliss vibration

and stay
it's

all

the time.

don't

know

if

this

is

true or not, but

certainly worth finding out. I do feel, though, that we should be as precise and as conscious as we can about which particular path

or yoga each of us should take. We should be very gentle with each other too, recognizing that

we

are at different karmic stages

different directions at

and we're going in the same time, and we must not get in each
levels,
all

and

other's way.

think

we

get the guru that

we

deserve.

We

all

get the

God we

deserve.

Some people would

settle for a Level Five

God. That's a conditioned reward-punishment deity the 39 articles of the Church of England. God, jealous and wrathful all the
time.
I

we can
two

have suggested that there are two general directions. Perhaps take only one of these in a lifetime. Perhaps there's a

rhythm, perhaps

we can

try

one and then the other. There are


is

different directions,

and one
is

to turn

on your body, that

is

the Tantric method.

The other

to turn off your body.

Now the

turn off school, says yes,

we

recognize that there are the senses,

179

TIMOTHY LEARY
we
recognize that there
is

the mind,
is

are the emotions, that there

and we recognize that there the body, and the dehcious chakras,

and you can have

ail

these exquisite sexual

and circulatory things,

but you've got to center all these and turn them off, turn them off, turn them off, until you're getting higher and purer and you
just stay

up in the electric flash-void-nirvana vibration state. Turn on the body or turn off the body. That's the choice.

Now the first way, the turn-on-the-body yoga, seems to require


the male-female unit, the spiritual marriage.

The

turn-off method,

you're trying to detach, you're trying to sever


externals, to all desires, so that
toerotic.
it

all

attachments to

becomes a closed system. Au-

And, of course, we're talking about two different manifestations of God, God as a male or God as a female, or God as the
union of the two.
It's

very likely that half of this audience

is

never

going to get married.

Oh, you may make

a social license contract,

but you're just not designed to be neurologically married. Perhaps your yoga is to take psychedelic drugs only once just to see

where you're at. There may be good reasons to do this division of men. The DNA knows what it's doing. The DNA deals out different sex
cards in other species.

Not

all

males pass on the

DNA

code. In

some

and troops of ungulates and primates, there's only one male that does it. There's a tremendous range here. It's not
tribes
just either/or.

We

are dealing here with the central issue that will


failure,

determine the success,


progress.

acceleration

of your spiritual

Now, if I suggest that maybe half of the people in this audience karmically are not designed to make a full-time yoga of psychedelic drugs or of spiritual marriage, I'm not putting you down,
nor do
to say
I want you to put us down. As a matter of fact, if I had which was the higher evolutionary form, I would say,

"turn-off" yoga. Learn


electric

how

to turn off your

body and

get into

or magnetic or laser-type communication. Evolution

180

The Berkeley Lectures


works on
anyway, so that what's down

a helical principle

now

is

many of you in this audience should up follow someone like Meher Baba, or Maharishi, or should go
later. It's

very likely that

It

back to a more orthodox form of Protestantism or Christianity. may well be that we're predestined to favor one of these yogas

or another.

Everyone these days puts down Calvin and those early Swiss hard-headed Protestants. They talked about predestination and
they laid
it

right out: that

some people

are going to

heaven and some


static

aren't. Well, there's a little truth in that.

make it to Not in

pessimism. But I consider Calvinism to be static Hinduism for those of you who are theologically inclined. It's erroneously

static in that there's

no question of
We're
all

spiritual failure. Just choice.

How we

do

it

may

be predestined by our genetic types. There's

no one-upmanship
central, solar soul

here.

going to meet eventually in that

bank where
it

know

the

harmonic sound

vibrating bright, and you There's makes. nothing there, no


it's all

bodies,

no

DNA code, just that bliss hum. The next time we meet
we spend
blissful eternities,

there, after

tons or neutrons or electrons again.

we may spin out as proAnd the next time around,


role of self-appointed high

some of you may have to play the which will serve you priest of LSD
around,
I'll

right!

And maybe
Baba,

next time
silent for

get to be

naked

in a cave in India, Sri

thirty years, with a constant orgasmic grin on my face. I want to be some kind of celestial psychologist. I will help each and every one of you to understand a little bit more about your

Maharishi: aka Maharishi

Mahesh Yogi, founded


chief

the Science of Creative

exponent of Transcendental Meditation Intelligence His the '60s. Spiritual Regeneration movement aimed to save the during world through meditation.

and became the

John Calvin: French thelogian v^ho systematized Protestantism, struggled with the "Libertines," and virtually ran Geneva through the College of Pastors

and Doctors and the Consistorial Court of

Discipline.

181

TIMOTHY LEARY
Spiritual diagnostic profile, or

your karmic propensity. Then you


takes you.

check

it

out and see where

it

know what the DNA code has I know at Millbrook really there were lots of people who came there who just weren't supposed to be on our turn-on-the-body, tantric-mating trip. And it was unsettling for them. Because we would be sitting around doYou
see, it's a

drag

if

we

don't

designed for us.

It

becomes a drag.

ing our thing and they


feeling

would be
door.
is

there, restless

and

rebellious

and

wrong when they should have been


leaflets at the

getting their kicks

passing out

The astrophysics are well known to any journeyman Hindu Holy man. Meher Baba knew it and the Maharishi knew it: If you can get a hundred million people saying "OM" at the same time, or chanting Hare
strategy

The world messiah

quite valid.

Krishna if they get enough people in that laser beam it really would destroy ignorance. The psycho-physics is obvious to many Eastern and Western thinkers. The tactics of the do-it-yourself trip are: select that basic vibration. If you're going to do it yourself, (that is, if you're not going
to take a body-Tantra-mating-spiritual marriage trip) just stay

down and

play games. But

if

you

really

want

to

make

a lifelong

voyage of discovery and you're going to do

it

yourself, then

you've got to start detaching from all external vibrations. Because it is obvious from ecclesiastical history that religion has to be
pure.
If

your renunciation movement

gotta be politically pure,


just

keep listening to

up energy, you you gotta keep listening to Meher Baba, him, and don't do anything else but just
if

starts stirring

keep listening to him, because


then
. . .

you do get

distracted

down here,
is

You've got the energy building up, building up, which


being transmitted to the biological unit that
get
all

not

electrons

and neutrons
is

stirring

was made up heat, with no


it

for.

You

relation-

ship to the proton. This

dangerous power.

The form of the

Tantric, the second spiritual path we're talking

182

The Berkeley Lectures


The DNA code. The interesting double heUx embracing. EmbracDNA code, And to create hfe, the DNA code can't just expand outward.
is

about,

the form of the body.


it's

thing about the


ing.

In folding. Inclusive.

You and

her.

Embracing. Colliding. The

DNA
ers,

starts to trip excludes the outer. When the erotic energy build up, as it often does around one of these great avatar preach-

or god-like presences, if it's used externally, sprayed around You get a system where politically, you get the Catholic Church.

men go around

in robes putting

you you and putting down sensuality and sexuality, and he's got a watch out. political-social organization he wants you to join, hey, As a matter of fact, those of us who are in the radical Tantric

that any time

see a

down women. And I suggest to man in drag putting down women,

camp sometimes
what
aren't they

think that

all politics is

are they doing fighting

mean, and debating with each other? Why


I

homosexual.

home with

her?

Or home, doing
. .

their

Om?

Remember the DNA As soon as erotic energy starts flowing double helical structure. Remember the atomic structure. Remem.

ber the laser.

primer on

a very interesting spiritual trip. Just read a simple atomic energy and the structure of the atom. You'll
It's

learn a great deal there about

how
this

to

make

love.

As

understand

the basic structure, you have


incredibly powerful charge.

And

with an proton then you have the electron spinin the center,

ning out around it. She comes in many forms, the Godly proton. She has different charges. With a charge of one proton, you have

hydrogen, and there's one electron up there, two, four, six, eight, up into the hundreds of electrons, but you always have that balance of charged electrons up there and the proton down home
center. That's

what we mean,

at Level

One, when we talk about


certainly contribute

the psychedelic marriage.

Then you ask about neutrons? Well, they


at
all.

to our creative culture. Consenting adult neutrons are

no problem

As a matter of

fact, they are probably at a higher level than

we, and the next time around we'll get decharged and

we won't

183

TIMOTHY LEARY
have to worry about the messy complexities of the plus-minus, yin-yang marriage. It gets pretty complicated, because in the neurological marriage, the spiritual marriage, the psychedelic marriage, you're turning on more energies, more possibilities of receiving and sending energy, and you're multiplying the possibilities

of hedonic confusion.

When I say that all power politics is a faggot hassle, I'm simply asking, why aren't they home with Her? Or in church with Him?
Eros spelt backwards
is

sore.

think

it's

no accident that

religions

which give you the spectacle of pale-faced men in robes putting down women and sexuality tend to produce the best policemen and the hottest wars.
I

do not think
an ashram

that's

an accident.

remember

visiting

in Rishikesh,

and there were a


to the Siv-

lot of

men

in robes there. That's cool. All

hooked up

ananda

beat. That's cool.

As

a matter of fact, the

men who were

leading this

ashram were
I

really radiant

good, solid vibrations,

could see how, perhaps, at another time, I could have, well, just sat down and grooved on that Rishikesh
strong enough that

Ganges rhythm. But one disturbing scene developed.


perhaps in

was

at a meditation,

and

my

honor,

many

of the younger monks, handsome,

well-groomed young men, ran

down

a valedictorian number.
It

Each one
It

recited his piece for twenty minutes.

was

incredible.

was all a put-down of women. And how her body is full of mucus and menstrual fluid and covered with hair, not to mention alimony, and henpecking, charge accounts, and women's liberation.

When
worked

was

a psychologist long, long ago at Berkeley,

once

any former patients, you've got my apologies. I was at the Esalon baths about a month ago with Rosemary, and there
of you are

at the University of California Psychiatric Clinic. (If

my

was

a lady in the bath, and she popped up out of the hot tub and she said, "I'm a former patient of yours." I said, "Do you forgive
in the tub for

me?" She popped down

about a half-hour to think

184

The Berkeley Lectures


and then she surfaced and
ogist, the hip issue

said, "Yes.")

When

was a psycholand
all

was

identity crisis. Erik Eriksen,

the

students were shooting up students

on

identity crisis.

There were also many

having homosexual panics. I consider most organized religion to be adolescent identity crises, if not a full-

who were

blown homosexual

panic.

You
messy

see, here is the

problem: Half of us are born

this

time
this

around, and we're basically, genetically charged to keep


life

thing going

down

here in the body.

released

from that

cellular addiction

And others are and can zoom out during

I would say maybe fifty percent of would be married out doing Tantra, if it weren't for social conditioning, which did not take their karma into account. So they become red-faced alcoholics. But I would

this lifetime. In this culture,

the Catholic priests

also suggest that fifty percent of Protestant ministers should not

be forced into marriage. So

much

for the differences

between these

two approaches. Let there neither be envy nor gratuitous putting down of matters which are determined by electrical charges. Next, I want to read from one of our bibles. This bible is titled
"Tantra
sensual
art." Its

philosophy
divine
is

is

physics.

It's

an incredibly smooth,

book

to touch
life

and handle.
from Brahma to a blade of
grass,

"In search of

everything in the

world

the creation of
get this

Maya

Shakti ..." This

book

is

by the same author as

Folk Art of Bengal, Folk

Toys of India, India Primitive Art.

The author extends his sincere gratitude to those who remain unnamed who initiated him into Tantra art, the exploration of which has been for him an engrossing spiritual adventure for over
a decade. His thanks go as well to several professors

who

aided

Erik Eriksen: This U.S. psychoanalyst born in Frankfurt, trained with Sigmund and Anna Freud, and specialized in the study of social and cultural
modification on children, postulating that there are 8 stages of velopment. He coined the term "identity crisis."

human

de-

185

TIMOTHY LEARY
materially in the

making of

this

book.

And

he gives a

final, in-

dispensable expression of gratitude to Sudha, who first instilled and then furthered a passion for a path so ancient and so new.

And

the right

with her, the author remembers something more, for which word can never be found.
the inscription of the
I

And

book
I

is:

"To Her."
anytime someone would

Before

understood what
it

now

understand about these bio-

physical matters,

used to disturb

me

come

if they came single. I'd say, where's Here's a restless electron spinning "Man, your proton?"

to talk to us at Millbrook,

through space looking for God. Whish! Whisht Whishl You know chemical heat that's burning, frictional explosion from colliding electrons, masculine smoke and noise. We had a lot of electrons
spinning though Millbrook, and through Harvard. And we'd say, "Well now, man, where's your better half?" I mean, in a way,

we're kind of monsters, going around with just half of us here

and where is she? I realize now that I was partly in error then. The two questions to ask a single person who approaches you
about a
spiritual matter are either,
is

"Where

is

she?" or

"Who

is

He, and what


opposites at

his

sound?

What
is

is

your master's vibration?"

The Psychedelic Marriage


all levels

the attempt to reach union of polar

of consciousness.

To work

out harmonies

of increasing energy intensities the union of the twenty-one yogas that tell you how it's going. The space-time coordinates are

important: Where? And in what position? Posture is an important and obvious step in reducing the hedonic gap. Practical rule number one in the neurological marriage
electron,
is

that you're never, as an


helical system,

apart from the proton. Or,

as

one part of

you're always in coiling rhythm with the other half. You keep asking the questions: Where am I going

now and

why?

186

The Berkeley Lectures


marriage involves some sort of an emotional lock than emotional harmony. For example, the sado-

Now, any
rather

masochistic, or power-submissive, or nurturant-dependent relationships


leader.

where the emotion


losing

is

the bind.

The

fear of losing

my

Or

my

tormenter.

Or

losing

my

victim.

The

fear of

order to pursue a spiritual marriage, obviously you have to center things at Level Six. That's the base pedal of the organ. There has to be severe trusting
losing, simply at that
level. In

emotional

harmony down

there.

devotional postures are involved here: to worship your avatar all of you devotees face him shoulder to shoulder. The
Islamic people have a beautiful thing going

Two

Mecca

five

times a day.

You

sense the

when they all face power when you know

everyone's shoulder to shoulder looking at Rishikesh, everyone's kneeling shoulder to shoulder facing Rome. That's your power
posture.

The posture for the neurological marriage is, of course. You're facing Him, You're facing Her. Where does it take place? Are you all facing forward in a temple?

Are you

all

facing

Mecca? Are you

all

facing

to get that big, global vibration? Trying to get that laser

Rome? Trying beam

going?

Or are you at home facing each other? The Level Five marriage is advertised in computer
fill

dating.

You

out the dating questionnaire and the computer tells you which social rewards and aversions you and she share. That's the typical marriage. We both like to bowl, and we're both Democrats, neither of us like to swim,

and we're both afraid of higher

taxes. If

you wish

to transcend the reward-punishment, socially condi-

tioned marriage, you have to start arranging your surroundings in such a way that you're going to get to a higher merger. The

temple of

The

the home, in the neurological marriage. where place you worship is not some building out there

God becomes

187

TIMOTHY LEARY
where you go with lots of other people. It has to be the inner shrine. The rituals are simply the practical methods you use to get to your goal. That's why there is an inevitable merging of external
games.
I

remember meeting

a tantric married couple in India about

four years ago


nostic sign.
tric

You know, you have

an impressive experience. There's an easy diaga psychedelic marriage or a Tan-

couple on your hands, if you can think of a couple that you know, and you've never seen them separately. You never see him

without her. Every time you see them, it's that way. Rosemary and I know about fifty such couples. You see, after a while, these
fused emanations and vibrations.

mind

too, so that

The helical thing cops your their names apart. You never never you say
it's

always Joe and Joan. They're just one person. When you're in the presence of such a couple (if you're alert to these hedonic matters) it's a powerful experience. You are
think of saying Joe,
dealing with a double-merged entity which

biochemistry tells us is more than the addition of its contingent parts. This couple in India lived in a little house. He was a Hindu, graduate of Oxall

ford.

think he wrote his Ph.D. thesis on D. H. Lawrence. She

was

a highly cultured European

woman, and
They

they had been living

in this little cottage for several years.

dressed exactly alike.

Their clothes, their robes were


see

made

in the village.

You would

them wandering together on the hilltop at sunset. Occasionally you would see them walking into town. After a while you realized that they woke in the morning and that they brushed each other's hair. They dressed each other. The whole rhythm of life everythat ever saw that was there was shared nothing they thing what wasn't a shrine object designed to enhance the sacredness of

D. H. Lawrence: This
ers,

influential

author of

Women

in

Love, Sons and Lovterrain of

and Lady Chatterly's Lover explored the untouched sexual emotion and was prosecuted for obscenity.

human

188

The Berkeley Lectures


they had going. It's a powerful experience to be in the presence of such fused divinity.

barrier.

At the Level Four union, we have broken through the hedonic Mating and marriages are more exciting at Levels Three

and Four. That means we start smoking a lot of grass together. Now, you remember what happens in a Level Five, Level Six
home. Husband and wife wake up in the morning, he showers, puts on his clothes, quick breakfast, drives to work. Every socially
conditioned

game

takes

him

farther

and

farther

from the

social

games

she's playing.

They

are in

now

in the supermarket, in the

two different rat mazes. PTA, and he's manipulating


farther apart.

She's

these

clients.

Their consciousness

is

now
and

completely separate. They are

in every sense dividing farther

Once
els,

the marriage breaks through into the unconditioned lev-

new games

of communication develop. At the beginning his

hedonic diagnostic index is different from hers, even at the sensory level. You both made the A+ in Sensory Energy 1-A and Marijuana 1-B but still, her thing is sound and music, where

you are more into taste and touch. So she's always turning you on to new scents, and you've been very agile kinesthetically with
yoga, but she can sure dance, see, so that an interesting exchange of sensual pleasure begins to unfold. You exchange yogas and teach each other how to control these various energies. The dance

becomes more complicated. You see, if the husband doesn't go off to work, but stays home all day, or they both go off together, they begin to share through the day the same game consciousness and the same sensory repertoire. They are more likely to smell
alike. They are more and more

eating the

same food. This whole

repertoire

is

unified, so that pretty soon telepathy begins to develop, not just because the Level Five social conditioning rat
is

shared. That's part of it, because they're both on the same board. But at the straight chemical neurological level, their game sense organs are being turned on by the same stimuli.

maze

189

TIMOTHY LEARY
I

do

believe that the great historical avatar sculptor design yan-

tra of

our nev^ Aquarian age

is

going to be along the

lines of that

naked picture of John Lennon and his Shakti published on the album cover and in Rolling Stone magazine. That's a historic religious shot because
it

compares favorably
his Shakti.

w^ith the classic

yab-

yum

position of

Buddha and

Compare

that beautiful

Adam

and Eve picture

as a religious avatar v^ith the classical do-

it-yourself unity avatars, bleeding

a lotus position, or flying

up The Level Three sexual communication is of great interest. After a w^hile, you begin to breathe more together. I'm sure that most of you during an LSD session have had the feeling of your

to heaven

on the cross, or sitting alone on a cloud.

in

body merging with a mate, so that it's just one heart, one pulse, one rate of circulation, one rhythm of breathing, one heart, and then the fibers begin to infiltrate and grov^ into one body. Merging
at the
is

somatic

level,

or in technical terms, the merging of chakras,

a lively discipline which will involve in the ecstatic university of the future.

many

university courses

Once you break through


it's

the hedonic barrier into consciousness

easier to

keep a marriage merging in closer and closer union.


right

Because

when you come

down
pretty

to

it,

we

are mirror similar.

We have the same sense organs, the eyes, the ears, the kinesthetics,
the smell and touch,

same organs that can merge and get in rhythm or out of rhythm and we can start charting these rhythms, because we have the same equipment.
the

we have

much

But when you get to the Level Two marriage it becomes very tricky, because Level Two is the level of your genetic or racial or mythic personality, and here, you get an entirely different
going. There's a
ball-

and you and your game Shakti find out that although you share the same conditioned reflexes, and you're wearing the same clothes, and all your sense
set of conditions,

new

organs and body parts are hooked up, and you're able to move into and out of all sorts of sensory rhythms perfectly and you're the hippest couple of the block suddenly you get too far into

190

The Berkeley Lectures


Level
gets

Two, and you


here.

realize that you're different

mythic types.

It

complex

need a new typology, a whole new language to understand what's happening. We happen to prefer the astrological language
for diagnosing essence,

We

and mythic

types.

You choose your own

Your understanding of who you are system at Level Two would be helped if you understood the pantheon of gods from Hinduism and from Greek Mythology because you are playing a part of Venus or Mars and now here comes Vulcan, and there goes Hermes. And of course when you do merge, you get four arms instead of two and she becomes Kali and you shrink down to a skinny Sova. The more you know about these old
^Jungian, tarot, etc.
relatives

and

friends the better off

Or

the mythic game.

you are in the god game now. The more you know about these tarot cards
to chart your

the better help


turf.

you can get

way through this celestial

Now,
cial

fortunately or unfortunately, we have many of these racards playing around, and many of you who have had deep

psychedelic experiences
carnations.
It's all

know

that

you spin through many


code.

rein-

there in the

DNA

Some

of our ancestor

humans

musculature.

and unfriendly then you even have the possibility no, I'd say even the certainty that many of your ancestral, racial karmic
are pretty untidy fellows with long jaws

And

astrological flashes are going to be

prehuman

that

is,

this in-

credible range of totem animals

and planetary rams and scorpions

and

lions

and

bulls

and so

forth.

Please,

the rules of the game: You're God and I'm God. no complaints about the pay. It's a full-time job. It does require that you start right from the beginning. You've got to be your own Moses, and you've got to decide about your own Ten Commandments. You've got to be Galileo, and discover the laws of gravity and magnetism.

You know

191

How To Drop Out

BEGIN WITH THE USUAL DISCLAIMER.


say tonight
is

NOTHING Fm GOING TO

designed to urge

There are no
revealed.

facts being presented

anyone to turn on or turn off. and no dogmatic truths being

VOICE
so

(from Audience):
it's

Why

Not?

Well, because

a tricky business.

We

are

all

so different, with

many

different possibilities.

We

are hurtling at accelerating


I

speeds in so

many

different directions.

may work
We're

for ten percent

Anything that and would confuse the other

suggest

ninety.

in talking about pleasure or the or the psychedelic experience. There's always spiritual experience the danger that for anyone that might be freed a little bit by what
all

aware of the gamble

they hear here, there'll be someone who'll be hung up. I sometimes wonder about the calculus or economics of hedonism. Certainly

millions,

millions

of

people

have

been

illuminated,

and turned on to a more joyous way of life in the last few years by what we have been doing. But there's also the possibility that for each person we have turned on and liberated,
liberated,
there's another

one that we have put uptight.

After the lecture last time, a

young man came up to me and


really

asked, "Well, Timothy,

is

LSD

good or

really

bad?"

192

The Berkeley Lectures

And

said, well, there are

two

theories.

The

first is

that

when
it

you use a mind-changing, consciousness-expanding drug like

LSD, you may be using up or squandering karmic


took you hundreds of
lifetimes that
sacrificed

virtues that
all

lifetimes to accumulate.

And

those

many

you did

good works and

fasted

and labored and

and passed out leaflets at the door you may be just blowing it all on one big 1968-69 LSD splurge. Cosmic drunken sailors. And we may all have to go back many lifetimes and pick

up the tab for our wasted Then there's the other


gence,

years.
possibility that extraterrestrial intelli-

God

or whatever you want to call Her,

saw

the mechanical

horror that was going on down here, and seeded the planet with this sacramental elixir which is the one and only way of getting
out,

and any day that you're not high on LSD


truth
lies

is

an absolute,

sinful waste.

The
in

either at

one extreme or the other or somewhere

between or both.

Of

course, the discourse in these meetings cannot be linear. In

McLuhan, we just can't do that Gutenberg The thing. exposition is helical. This is an interesting audience to talk with. It's certainly not an audience to talk down to. Sometimes I see air and the audience is levitating and smiling at me
the age of Marshall

with liquid eyes.

We

try to contact everyone at

one point or anaddicted to the

other during the evening. For those

who

are

still

linear-Gutenberg
called
in the

One is High Priest and the other is called Politics of Ecstasy. And later, lighter book. Politics of Ecstasy, much of the material
habit, I've written

two books

recently.

Marshall McLuhan: This Canadian philosopher heralded the Information

Age

in

books

like

Understanding Media and The

Medium

is

the Massage.

Like Leary,

McLuhan

believed that the response to

what he coined "the


life-

global village" v^ould be the formation of tribes and a return to tribal


styles.

193

TIMOTHY LEARY
that we've been discussing here
subject-predicate sentences.
is

laid

down

in paragraphs

and

The

topic of tonight's discussion


life.

is

How To

to live the psychedelic

How

to live a turned-on

Drop Out. How life on this

uptight planet.

Before getting into this area, I'd like to review very briefly what

we've been talking about in the last two meetings. The first evening was devoted to a discussion of psychedelic
psychology. Pleasure. How to produce pleasure. The relationship between the unconditioned pleasurable state and the conditioned

Reward-punishment, social conditioning, was cited ominous trap, the Pavlovian prison from which we must
state.

as the
all es-

cape.

We
ness

considered the hedonic index

seven levels of conscious-

each of which can be brought about by specific and precise use of the proper drug. We talked about the need to crack the

hedonic barrier with chemical propellants. We discussed the hedonic gap which exists at all times in every encounter be-

tween people. Someone's down.


There
is

either getting

you high or bringing you

something that

did not emphasize enough in the disoff: It all

cussion of turning on and turning


That's

has to do with time.

what turning on and turning off is all about. Man has now discovered that he does not have to live just with socially conditioned time. Level Five time, five o'clock, three o'clock, 17th of

January, First inning. Fourth quarter, 1968, 1969. These are the little identification numbers tacked over the particular maze of

alleyways that

we

select

during
little

quences. Social time has very

to

our reward-punishment sedo with biological time or

pleasurable time or celestial time or solar time or seasonal time.

Turning on or turning off is entirely a matter of slowing down or speeding up time. As soon as you leave clock time, as soon as you leave the social conditioned level, you start playing around
with time.

194

The Berkeley Lectures


In discussing the methodology of psychedelic psychology, we mentioned that there were 21 yogas, that is 21 ways of turning

ways of expanding consciousness. One of these is drugs. Another is Tantra, the sexual union of male and female. I emphasized these as maha-yogas. The more energy you release (unon, 21

you're just going to expand in a gaseous acid cloud) the you need the yogic methods for harnessing and aesthetically
less

more man-

aging the erotic energy that's being produced.

Another
ogy.
I

trip

we took

in the first

two

lectures:

pushed

astrolis

did this with

many

cautionary disclaimers. Astrology


of our

the
in

oldest

and best-known method of understanding human nature

terms of cyclical time.


ogies

Most

modern "dynamic" psycholbefits a

and philosophies are quite

static as

mechanical

reward-punishment society. But the religions and philosophies and psychologies of tomorrow just have to be temporal. They
have to account for the fact that

we

are hurtling through accel-

erating experience and we are constantly changing. None of our current psychologies do this. Freudian psychology, conditioning

psychology, even Jungian psychology, doesn't allow for the inevitability of things changing rapidly. The highest and best philosophy, the basic doctrine that brings us right
the Taoist philosophy.
written.

down

to earth

is

The Tao

te

Ching
is

is

the greatest

book ever

some way of diagnosing yourself and diagnosing your situation, finding out who you are in terms of a system of rhythmic changes. I don't care what sequential system you use, but I think you'd be wiser and better
I'm really pushing here

What

equipped to handle the next decade


of rhythmic change.

The Taoist

you develop a psychology Ching is a good method for


if

this. There are many people who get up in the morning and, instead of consulting a calendar, they throw the / Ching. They get to the office and then when they're going to buy or sell,

doing

they consult the

Ching.

Ching is very much like a simple six-line ticker tape from the cosmic marketing center on some celestial Wall Street. The I

The

195

TIMOTHY LEARY
Ching summarizes for you
in six lines the current status of the

cosmic marketplace. It's the celestial Dow-Jones report utilities are up and commodities down. The minute-to-minute six-bar
reading of the
I

Ching
oil

is

based upon millions and millions of

individual energy exchanges.


sells

The

little

old lady in

Andromeda

one share of

and

it

contributes to the cosmic trend.

One

time at Millbrook

we

constructed an

Ching clock.

We

lined up the I Ching yin-yang lines, in such a way that you got a continual belt in which any trigram or any hexagram was equally probable. We attached it to a polygraph, so that every four sec-

onds another
look at the

line

would drop. You walk

into the

room, and
it

in-

stead of looking at the hour clock to see


I

what time

was, you

Ching clock and get a reading. I want to repeat my disclaimer about the astrological revelations that were made last week. I divided the astrological chart
into those sun signs

which are more


trip. I

likely to

be into a turned on,


that before

psychedelic marriage
the next day

want you

to

know

noon

got seven calls from Pisceans, and eleven calls from Aquarians who had stayed up all night, and wanted us to
that there

we

know

was

a different system, and

we were

delighted

because, of course, that's the

name

of the game. Develop your

week caused any you to think about who you are and why you turn on or turn off, and who is your God, and who is your mate, and do you want a mate anyway, do you really in a genetic sense, a radical
religion. If the astrological statements last

own
of

sense, a neurological sense

want

to get married

if

my

specula-

tions stirred

up any such thoughts which help you understand


I

yourself better, well,

rest

my

case.
is

The
it's

third

major theme of these lectures

the poetic and im-

passioned defense of the male-female religious unit. Here again


a risky terrain were entering.
lectures

Anyone who

gets

up on a

plat-

form and

or reckless.

Why

about the male-female relationship is either nuts am I doing it? Because I think that there's too

196

The Berkeley Lectures


on autoerotic reUgion. I think that most gurus, most people that go around teaching and preaching the religious path, and writing books about the religious trip, and
currently
proselytizing

much emphasis

and

lining

Now,

that's cool.

up followers are on autoerotic kicks. This time around perhaps half of us are detrip.

signed for that kind of

On the
wife.

other hand, the very nature of the

game

is

such that the


a husband-

other half are involved in the Tantric path, that

is,

A man and woman mate and begin having higher and higher
As they
start

hooking up more and more Level Five games and hooking up more body functions together and sharing more and more space and time together, tremendous energy starts
experiences.

building up in the inner spaces.

It's

a nuclear energy, electron-

proton power tap.

It's

new

religion.

A new

form of God! But


or recruit

the Tantric couple typically doesn't rush onto a lecture platform.

Typically they don't write books or

hand out
at

leaflets

hundreds of co-believers. They're too busy


autoerotic or turn-off religions tend to get
all

home. The electron


the headlines,

more of

pass

the laws, define the social codes,


is

My aim here
on that
and

to counteract the fear

and derogate the Tantric. and guilt which society lays

half of

you who discover

racial soul essence,

you examine your genetic that the way for you to find God is in the
as

ancient and sacred union of the opposite sexes.

Drop Out. How to live the detached life which allows you to grow higher and higher. There are two ways to do this. If you're serious about the spiritual path,
Next we
talk

about

How To

you should experiment and


in a bi-polar duality, or

figure out

whether you should do


it

it

whether you should do


in

by yourself.
is

You have

to

become God

any case, the question

are

you

going to follow a neutral male model, or are


yourself to a male-female religion

you going to orient which centers around the febefore these terms can

male.

God becomes woman. Now,

make

any sense, some turning-on process has to take place.

197

TIMOTHY LEARY
The situation starts like this: The basic unit is positive-negative from the time it hooks up into a dance. That's molecular structure. That's v^hy and how^ we're all here. The minus charges are male and the plus are w^omen (do it any w^ay you w^ant). It's all
sw^irling

around

like a

aim of the

social conditioning process

cloud or a junior high school poem. The is to get each of these en-

ergy structures into a game.

The

social

energy going along social channels. negative particles there are electrons. You have unattached electrons and protons milling around the neighborhood. From our rudimentary

game tries to Assume that the

get

all

of this

knowledge of atomic physics we see that there are two possibilities, the laser model or the atomic model. Let's assume that some

Now, when you turn on, more energy starts developing. It can occur at any level. Some way, someone gets the energy going and pretty soon he develops his own beat. The charismatic leader. The other choice is to hook up in a bi-polar relationship. But both electron and proton must be equally charged. The atomic or
of these individuals start turning on.
the bi-polar relationship,

which
is

is

the Tantric, yin-yang, male-

female, plus-minus

model

embracing.

And

as

it

embraces

it

be-

comes

expansive. That's a rhythm that you see in all nature. As an atom or a planetary system or a galaxy hurtles through space, it makes a helical form, the moon going around the around
less

the earth, the earth going around the sun, the sun
center,

around

galactic

and the electron going around the proton. Because of the attracting charges, plus and minus, you get an embracing
hook-up. These are essentially the two choices for handling increased energy.

There's no problem
conditioning.

if

you want

to stay at Level Five in social

You just go along the maze, turning left and right and up and down, and that's cool. It's over very quickly that way. The best addictive narcotic around is just to go to school and get
a job. But
if

you want

to start releasing energy,

if

you want

to

198

The Berkeley Lectures


you want to break out of the socially conditioned, reward-punishment rat maze you have to consider these two possibilities, of getting a laser thing going or electrondecondition yourself,
if

proton. Notice that the Tantric units tend to cluster into tribal
structures.
life, and the aesthetics of your drop out is which of these choices you make. Much of the dependent upon confusion and much of the friction and much of the anguish and

The

style

of your

much

of the turning off that occurs in psychedelic communities,


is

in psychedelic marriages, or in the psychedelic culture at large

simply that people get into the wrong energy field, wrong for them. They think that the way to do it is Tantric when their own

karmic direction
in

is

probably

laser.

There
it

your

life

when you want

to

do

be rhythmic cycles for awhile in an autoerotic

may

way and

later in a bi-polar

way. And

there's

no

stasis here.

In the electron-proton Tantric trip the proton becomes God. Where's your proton? Endless complications and expansions. As the male and female begin to orient more and more towards each
other, at Level Five, he doesn't

go to the

office

and she doesn't

Women Voters. They're together all the time so that even the systems of social rewards and punishments become shared. At Level Four and Level Three, sensory and body
go to the League of
contacts
released.

More

become deepened and more complex. More energy is energy begins to develop. Higher charges. The pro-

one or many charges. Lonely neutrons are attracted, adding both mass and beauty to the atomic structure. The electron is the free male hurtling out of orbit. The effect
ton, as a result, can have

of the unattached electron on the positive-negative atom, of course, can be destructive. Electrons

VOICE: (Singing) Why don't we do LEARY: The unattached electrons,


199

it

on the

stage?

as they collide, cause heat.

TIMOTHY LEARY
But when the female principle, the proton, merges, nuclear can develop. (Pause. Beautiful young woman walks on
stage)

fission

What

sign are you?

GIRL:

Leo. (The

woman
in

begins to disrobe

on

stage.)
. .

LEARY: We have found

our research that Leos

GIRL: Excuse me, I'm Stephanie, Leo.

LEARY:

Stephanie Leo. Well,

we have found

that Leo

women

operating on the

solar principle have the highest proton

charge

GIRL: Stephanie Lovelace woman. Leo. (She


bracing the microphone.)

is

now

naked, em-

LEARY: Do you have an LEARY: How many?

electron?

GIRL: Yeah, a few of them.

GIRL: Which one would you

like?

LEARY:

Right.

GIRL: Which one?

LEARY: Which
choice?

electron

would

like?

You mean

I've

got a

GIRL: You can take your

pick.

LEARY:

Right. Protons repel other protons. Appropriate distance is thus maintained between protons. The union of protons is an aspect of this science that I think perhaps no man

can understand. The more


the

we

study the nucleus of the atom,

more we

realize that inside the

proton there

is

a universe,

a galaxy of incredible energy and beauty. Mesons, and subnuclear particles


. . .

GIRL: What

sign are you?

LEARY: I'm a Libra and Rosemary's a Taurus. GIRL: What is your name? What is Rosemary's name? LEARY: Rosemary and I both have moons in Sagittarius and Aquarius rising. My name is Timothy Leary. Timothy means fearer of God, Timor-theo, he who fears God. And then I got
Leary, right?

200

The Berkeley Lectures


GIRL: From Love, for Leary, L, LEARY: Ecstasy. GIRL: What does R stand for? LEARY: Rosemary.

What

does the

stand for?

GIRL:

LEARY:

hke Rosemary, too. Yes, Rosemary. I asked Rosemary what to do, and Rosemary

says, "Tell

her she's queering the act."


(laughter)

GIRL:

Is

Timothy Leary queer?


I

LEARY:

think that after one turns on, a period of cautious and


. . .

open-minded appraisal GIRL: Why are you so cautious?

LEARY:

I told you. My name is Timothy Leary. GIRL: About being warm. I'm Leo, Timothy Leary.

Why are you

so cautious?

LEARY: Do you think I'm cautious? GIRL: Yeah. Why? Why are you so cautious? LEARY: Well, I have this vision of all of us spinning around
energy charges. I don't think I'm cautious. to be all right, don't you?
I

as

think

it's

going

GIRL: Yeah. Well, why are you so cautious?

LEARY:

Well,

why

not?
to

GIRL: Because you have


verbal.

make

sure of

what you

say. That's

LEARY: Just a minute. GIRL #2: I hate to say this,

against the law (laughter) and unfortunately at any moment now somebody's going to come in here and throw us all out.

but this

is

Voice: Don't

we have any freedom?

Other
GIRL

Girl's Voice: Put your clothes back on.

(audience reaction, mixed)


#2: Then not only that, but other two seminars, either.
all

we won't

be able to have the

GIRL: We're

as

one now.

201

TIMOTHY LEARY
GIRL #2: Don't worry about it. LEARY: Here's what I think we
after the lecture.

should do. I think we should have three or four alternate and conjunctive points of view,

How's

that?

GIRL: No. After the

lecture?
I'll

LEARY:

After the lecture. Okay. Well, then while. (Applause.)

just

rap on for a

One

the change.

of the interesting things that happens at these seminars is If you'll notice, I don't lay down a consistent, heavy

rhythm. It's deliberate. I'm not trying to develop a laser effect here. I'm usually delighted when things get thrown off because
evolution operates. During the years Mill brook (as a matter of fact, for the last four or
that's the

way

we were
five, six,

at

or

a laser beam. That

seven years) there have been continual pressures on me to set up is, to set up a messiah beat that hundreds,
to.
I

thousands, or millions of people could reverberate

could have

done

it.

There were many pressures on us to announce the Avatar

arrival.

As you well know, we always refused

changing,

we

kept moving,

we

to do that. We kept never set up one message, except

perhaps, just that message to stay loose and keep changing. Perhaps some people are going to be disappointed tonight, or some

people were disappointed


into
it is
I

last night, that

we

couldn't get everyone

one mantra, get everyone into one comfortable for us to work.

beat.

That

is

not the

way

you one other thing about our way of teaching. more and more energy starts around and there are always the selfish traps. You hold kicking
to
tell

want

As you

get into the psychedelic yoga,

the energy back.


It

You

try to control

it.

You

use

it

egocentrically.

may be reassuring to some of you, it may make some of you feel good to hear me say that I have been pretty much 99% pure.
I

am

often mistaken

on day-to-day

tactics,

because you never do

better than

50%

on behavioral

choices, but as far as trying to

202

The Berkeley Lectures


control the energy or direct

it,

or get secular rewards from

it,

that

has not been

my

problem,

really.

The

do-it-yourself God Game,

the autoerotic yoga

is

where you

decide to accept the whole stage yourself, and you're going to

play the star role, and you're going to detach yourself from as

many
self.

external appearances as possible.

building up, the

more

difficult

it

gets

The more energy you start to do this by your social


are playing the energy

There are thousands of people

who

game, and invariably you'll find them out in the desert, out on the mountains, in some little shack. There are thousands, hun-

who are getting more high, some more through drugs, some through energy going, getting sunsets and fresh air and being out in nature, being away from people. The more energy you get going, the more erotic stuff and that's the only point of life the more you that's developing
dreds of thousands of such people
just

have to detach yourself from the social-conditioned dance. You have to do it. Eventually you just can't spend time or space in the social reward-punishment systems. You drop out both tem-

porally and spatially.

GIRL

#2: I'm at a loss at

what

to do. (To Girl #1,

who

is

naked

embracing the microphone) Are you trying to get us busted?

Man,
Voice:
Voice:

really,

we're going to get busted.


... to finish this lecture.

GIRL: I'm waiting

We

all

have bodies.

What do you want? GIRL: To finish this lecture.


we
are going to

Voices: Put your clothes on. GIRL #2: We have to decide what
because
if

do

collectively

LEARY: The

don't then we're going to be gone, any minute. Living Theatre is appearing next week in Berkeley.

we

There's topless at North Beach every night, Monday through uh, the mike is off. Are we turned off. Turned Friday. Well

203

TIMOTHY LEARY
off? (tapping).
right.

Are we turned on? turned on? (tapping). All

The key
and

to living the dropping out

is

the

management of space

time. Territory
is

territory that

free

becomes very important. You have to have from social-conditioning pressure.


dropped out
life is

The key
self.

to living a

to free territory for your-

Protect yourself from destructive reward-punishment condi-

tioning.

Now this doesn't necessarily mean that you have to have


It

a Utopian thousand-acre ranch in Nevada.

can

just
is

mean your

shrine apartment. But there has to be a place that


territory.

free spiritual

You can

actually talk here about seven levels of space.

We have
in in

been studying the problem of hedonic space at Millbrook and other Utopian communities and Utopian groups. It is useful
this primitive stage of

our rudimentary science to keep different

spaces reserved for different levels of consciousness.


give you an example. At Millbrook, we had this large estate which was surrounded by a state highway. Now the stage highI'll

way was

really uptight territory.

And when you

left

the gates at

Millbrook you were getting into an emotional situation at Level Six Fear. There were armed police cars going back and forth,

gun blockades, that sort of thing. As soon as you got on the estate, the big central mansion had a lot of social conditioned games but

New York City or the marketplace But there were Level Five games. reward-punishment games going. How to run the place. How to keep the various groups in harmony. How to cook and clean. There were rules and regulathey were not necessarily the

and rewards and punishments always being set up and changed. Apart from this Level Five center, there were areas
tions

where people could go to get higher. There were meditation


areas eshouses, meditation gardens, groves, shrines, waterfalls pecially set aside where people could meditate and get high.

204

The Berkeley Lectures


could invariably predict, after a person had been at Millbrook about a week, exactly which level of consciousness he liked to inhabit by where he put his
interesting thing happened.

An

You

body. There were some people that would be at Millbrook for two or three days and they had to drive into New York City. They were always going into town. They were just hooked on Level Six thrills.

Other people would hang around the house all the time, grooving behind the fascinating and interesting Level Five games. At

you could go from Level Five to Level Four. There were other people who preferred to spend most of their time outside, and actually moved out to meditation houses, little
the house,

shacks around the large house.

And
camp.
Level
ness.

then, far

up

in the

large house, there were nature


It

woods, about two miles away from the communes. There was a Level One

was

well understood that

you would never go to

this

One camp unless you were You would never think of

at the highest level of conscious-

talking there.
like,

You would
"Hey, the

never

think of bringing any low-level problem,


at the gate."

sheriff's

GIRL: Timothy Leary.

LEARY: Timothy

The name Timothy Leary was never mentioned on Level One, where you are and I'm not. Dear, you must be patient with me. GIRL: I know, I know. (Audience applause and voices.) Why are
Leary, right.

Voice:

you threatened? Why are you yelling? We want to hear Timothy Leary. GIRL: Listen, then.

LEARY: There sit down


. .

is,
.

you know, we've got to get the

issue

please

GIRL:

Listen, then.
Sit

LEARY:

down, honey,

sit

down.

We

see very clearly in eve-

205

TIMOTHY LEARY
nings like this and
It all

all

around us the problem of neurological

has to do with the hedonic gap. courtesy. down too far for you. That's the problem.

You

see,

I'm

We

used to see

this at

our centers. There would be a group of

people quite high, at Level Four, at Level Three, at Level

Two.

room, and the fire would be crackling, and maybe there'd be music playing. There would be silence. You would hear
They'd be
in a

people breathing occasionally. Someone might murmur like one Zen statement that had many reverberations. Everything would

be quiet, and then suddenly some people from New York would come rattling in. I remember the time a bon vivant socialite from

New York
drinks.

He

walked into one of these rooms. He'd had a couple of said, "Hi everybody!" And then he did what anyone

would do

at a cocktail party.

You

either orbit

around the

prettiest

woman

or you start a competitive argument with the smartest

man, right? He was coming on that way, and the hedonic gap became so obvious that he became uptight, and we had to say,
well,

we

just

have a hedonic gap here. Neurological courtesy


is

in

the future will be an important part of living.

say to

somebody

not

"How

are

The first thing you'll you?" but "Where are you?"

You

I'm hovering between Level Four and Level Five right now. You are at Level Two and Three. Delicious. And we just
see,

must be very

polite to each other.

By dropped

out,

simply

mean

that you're not

hooked up to

reward-punishment systems. This clearly involves a movement out of the cities. It's inevitable that there be
involuntary social
a

movement

of turned on people out of the

cities.

People

live in

the cities because the cities are the networks of secondary, tertiary,

come back down

quaternary socially conditioned punishments and rewards. You to the cities because you want to rip off some

206

The Berkeley Lectures


symbolic reward that probably has very
to

little

do with who you


in this

are and what you're designed to do. The economics, the hedonic economics of land
is

country

very interesting. Ninety percent of the people live on ten percent of the land. This is hedonic horror. But it also means that ten
percent of the people live on ninety percent of the land! Throughout human history we have defined wealth, real wealth
as real estate.

The amount of land you can wander through

freely

without being fenced in or fenced out. Therefore there is a perfect correlation here: The more valuable the land for hedonic purposes, the cheaper
it

is.

The average couple, you know,

gets a

house in Berkeley for twenty thousand, thirty thousand dollars. For that amount of money, you can get a hundred acres in a
territory that
is

designed for hedonic

life.

(To

girl, softly:

You

sit

down. Flower,

until I'm through.)

Now,

the economics of this are as follows:

It

takes about ten

thousand dollars to buy your way out of the American system. If you have ten thousand dollars, maybe a little more, you can buy
your way out of the reward-punishment system. Then you ask me, "Well, where am I going to get ten thousand dollars?" And I say, "Well, the average cop makes ten thousand dollars a year.

And

if

you and your

girl

and a few of your

friends aren't smarter

than that ..."

The thing to do is to buy land. That's hedonic practicality number one. It doesn't matter whether you want to turn off or turn
on or take the
the land
fast

deep sleep or the slow heaven

trip.

The

wisest

now is to buy land. And the farther from urban society the better. If you get a piece of land which has no access and no highways nearby, and not even
advice anyone can give you
is

207

TIMOTHY LEARY
nearby, and no electricity, and no urban water 50 supply, and no television within a hundred miles, well, wow an acre, right? Who wants that? Buy land that is not likely to be
a country road
is

built

up by Howard Johnson
There
is

in the near future.

Such land, of
spir-

course, has the lowest value monetarily


itually.

and the highest value


problem

no

nasty, acquisitive, capitalist

here.

There

is

a simple and effective

way

of handling the spiritual prob-

lem of money. You buy the land and then you deed it over to an ecological spiritual group, or some unbreakable trust. The land
that we have bought is deeded over to an unbreakable trust. It can never be used for anything that involves commercial profit-

making. In other words, you buy the land, and then you deed back to God.

it

you going to live with? Most of the spiritual groups most publicized are ashrams. People who get land and a big house and they all come and live in the big house.
are
that have been the

Who

Most ashrams
that as
this

that I've seen in this country are benign, gentle,

mental hospitals. I'm not putting

down

ashrams. I'm just saying

more and more people turn on, more and more people get energy flowing, unless they're hooked up, either to some big vibration in themselves, or some vibration like Meher Baba, Maharishi, or whatever, or unless they're hooked up in positivenegative Tantric bonding, as this energy starts to explode there

what an acid freak is. He's an electron that's got more and more energy propelling him faster and faster and faster and farther and farther. And there's nothing wrong with that I'm not putting that down. You simply have to watch out and cheer as they spin by. As a
are going to be
freaks. That's

more and more acid

matter of fact any civilization that believes in spiritual growth should give its young people this opportunity to turn on, spin off, freak out for a year or two, or more.

GIRL:

Why

don't you
sit

tell

us?

About LSD.
wait
till

LEARY:

Just

back honey.

You
208

I'm finished, and then

The Berkeley Lectures


you can ask questions. Conflicting rewards and punishments
here! (laughter)

with

I'm talking about the acid freak-out! I don't see anything wrong this loose, undirected energy. I think that there should be a

period of time

be no rush to
follow
It is
I

when kids can just explore the galaxy. There should make a spiritual decision as to whether you want one big beat or hook up with a member of the opposite sex.
do
this aimless exploring.

right that there exist places to

think that the Haight-Ashbury

was

essentially a space univer-

always saw Haight-Ashbury as an incredible school, perhaps one of the most successful free universities in world history. Thousands of kids who would have been studying pencil sharpening at Omaha Teachers College wandered to San Francisco and
sity. I

they learned something. college of hard-knocks,

It
if

was

a rough-tough university.
will

It

was

but that's part of the lesson, you too. There were an enormous number of very turned on gurus

and teachers and alchemists and wizards and occult


around that
university.

specialists

Similar things of course go

on

in other areas,

Laguna Beach,

one such place where you'll find thousands of barefoot suntanned kids who are turned on, trying
(applause)

Laguna Beach

is

out different roles and opening themselves up to

new

teachers,

going on

they're trying yoga and chanting and they're and vegetarians they're astrologers and they're studying with Zen masters and there's a ferment, a buzzing beehive of kids, and of
diets

and

course they are very free sexually as they should be in any sensible tribe before they've made their neurological mating choice. There's nothing negative about the acid freakout. There's nothing derogatory when I say that most ashrams are collections of free
electrons

and neutrons

who

are looking to get

hooked up somehave to

how and
It is

this is the perfect place for

them.

typical of
It

ashrams that stay

in business that they


it

have one beat.

has to be Ramakrishna, or

has to be Krishna,

209

TIMOTHY LEARY
has to be some charismatic mommy swami. There's got to some be person, or there has to be some strong identity that lays down that beat. The basic mantra. There have to be rules in such ashrams. If you sign up with Swami Bhaktivedanta and become a Hare Krishna person you are immediately handed rules. You
or
it

can't ball without a license,


certain hours for this
rules.

and

that.

you can't eat certain things, you have Ashrams of this sort have to have
can't have people taking psychedelic

And
if

they are, for the most part against psychedelic drugs.

And
vibe,

rightly so, because

you

drugs

you've got a big central beat, a rah-rah-Ramakrishna

an

Om

all

the

way with Meher Baba

going. Because

when

the people start taking drugs, they'll begin wandering around the
stage, vibrating to their
this

own body

beat,

and no ashram can have

going on, and stay in business.

are good for people who are not hooked up. Chuck Dederich of Synanon, for example, has set up a tribal group which has that one big beat it's him. He's a strong and powerful beat

Ashrams

to his place

and a good beat with no fooling around. Now, you just can't go and set up another beat. Most ashrams are set up this

way. I think that the function of such ashrams is to help neutrons and electrons get settled, and then they can decide whether they

want

or perhaps go back to a bi-polar, male-female atomic energy system. If you're on the male-female Tantric yoga, there gets to be a time when you've got so much energy going between the two of you, that, you know, you just
to stay in that kind of
life

need more space, particularly


vious
ical

if

you have

children.

It is

the ob-

God-designed, marriage produced the third

DNA

Law

of Three plan that the neurolog-

God who

is

the

new

person. So

Chuck Dederich: The founder of Synanon, Dederich began


a drug rehabilitation center, but
it

his

program

as

with Dederich himself as

its

evolved into a large, cult-like religion, leader. In 1980, Dederich pleaded no contest to

charges that he solicited an assault on an L.A. lawyer by having a rattlesnake

placed in the lawyer's mailbox.

210

The Berkeley Lectures


and energy developing and drift into the tribal

that for these

many

reasons

children

the Tantric couple has to leave the city

v^ay of

life.

When we
are there?

visit

an ashram, or a psychedelic community, imthing w^e look for


is this:

mediately, the

first

How many kitchens


some ashrams where

Where

are the protons?

You

see

everybody eats in the same big institutional kitchen. That is the derogation of women. Because if women go into a laser system,
they have to take on that same neater beat of Ramakrishna, Meher Baba, Jesus Christ. There's always a depreciation of My

Goddess. In these monasteries and big ashrams, if each Goddess doesn't have her own fire, her own kitchen and her own home
shrine thing, then she's a dietitian.

And

that's cool. That's all

right, because there are many women who, for karmic reasons, are supposed to take this neuter trip, which does lead to seeress

or witch or prophetess or high priestess. In


find

many ashrams

you'll

women who

have merged themselves, they've given up their

charge, or at least they've tried to. (In

some

cases they weren't

very charged.) They take on the rhythm of the guru beat, so that they are no longer
highly Christian

women,

they are neuters.

When you

have

women

going around making speeches to the


a travesty

PTA

putting

down pornography, you have

on the

whole

situation, that a

up a male

religion

woman has given up her divinity and taken which leads her to go around putting down
many
psychedelic situations are

such things as the female body. Many tribal communities and

based on the stable unit of the male-female union. At Millbrook, all the time we were operating there, we had many couples who

were

living in the

bowling

alley, the

meditation houses, and out

in little off places,

keeping their

own
see

double helical rhythm going.


it

That's a beautiful model.

You

happening

in Big Sur. In-

credibly powerful male energies

and incredibly powerful earthin Big Sur that

female energies there. The

men and women

we've

met

just radiate incredible Tantric strength. You'll find a little

211

TIMOTHY LEARY
cabin on this
this
hill

canyon.

It

with kids, and you'll find another cabin down works there, this tribal model. Stable male-female
together.

families
It's

who band

very tricky to bring two highly-charged protons together. As you know, that's nuclear fusion. There has to be precise territorial distance

not aesthetically right. proton You're not giving each proton her due. But, if you can get three or four or five or six men who are solidly mated hooked into a
into
It's just

women

between protons. one kitchen.

You

just can't

cram a bunch of

tribal structure, the

energy thus created can do anything. Such a


literally do anything, including the amount of money needed to buy the small do it. The interesting thing that happens in

group of charged atoms can


raising of a small

amount of land to communes, whether laser-ashram or a


that
all

tribal

group of

families,

is

the Level Five social

games get overlapped. Instead of each


four or five or six

man
the
are

going out to his job,


sharing verbally as

all

men

are sharing

same problems of
all

survival

and economics. And the

women
when

women
when

should, from house to house,


they're in the sauna, or

or

when

they're washing, or

they're sunning or watching the kids.

telepathic network de-

velops in any village, because everyone tends to

know

exactly

what everyone
constraining.
village,

is

We

doing and thinking. This doesn't have to be have the horrible image of the New England
this sort of thing

Peyton Place, where

becomes very inbred

and

repressive.

is only one way, however, that a tribal group of this sort can exist and survive. They must take plenty of dope. Unless they have developed some tribal festivals that blow the mind regularly,

There

they gotta smoke it. You've got to have that liberating sacrament, otherwise the energy gets static. They've got to take dope, or have some mind-blowing festival, and it's got to be pretty regular, or

people freeze. Robot plastic people develop. People get uptight. There are always problems and emotions when you get highenergy people, moving at fast accelerations into a psychedelic age.

212

The Berkeley Lectures


You're bound to get frictions and collisions, but the effect of Level Four and Level Three liberations will be to diffuse the resentment.
Pretty soon you're giggling
spective.

and laughing from the higher per-

Of

course, you're not just building

up Level Five

telep-

athy and communication, but Level Four as well.

A very interesting and important device in any commune of this sort is the sauna or sweat lodge. We look in gratitude to our
tutors, the

about
I

tribal

American Indians. They have so much to teach us life. In some of these communes that Rosemary and

have shared, every afternoon at about three o'clock the

women

assemble and have a sauna.


the

And

every night at five or six o'clock,

men come back from

cutting the

wood
sit

out dealing or whatever they do, and

or plowing or going around in the sauna, and

there's that sense of sharing this sensory, righteous, spiritual ex-

perience,

and you're conscious


hierarchy at
all.

at the

same

level.

In a well-run tribe of this sort,

or

much

you do not need much structure Rosemary and I have lived with one

such brotherhood, and, from the time it was started until we left after six months, there had never been a meeting where people

down. Brother, there's no point to it. I mean everyone knows where everyone else is at. Everyone knows what's happening.
sat

Everyone knows what has to be done. In any such

tribe, if

you

think you have to have rules and regulations, put up lists and that sort of thing, you better just go off to the sauna and turn on, and
think
it

through.
be, in the tribal

There tends to

commune, much more freedom

of choice. The ashram, on the other hand, has to have this one

rhythm.

It

has to have rules. The ashram tends to be a renunci-

atory thing.

The ashram

can't allow psychedelic drugs.

The

free

ashrams that we have seen that have used drugs have not lasted
very long.

Two months,

The

tribal or village

months, a year. Dope is a tribal ritual. model provides a tremendous amount of


six

freedom. Individuality plays a big part here. Each person in such a tribe gets to know pretty well his genetic type or his astrological

213

TIMOTHY LEARY
type.

You

begin to sense

best at cutting the

who is best at raising the wood, who is best at repairing

bread,

who

is

the machines.

These differences are based on very early genetic blueprints. There's one thing that's obvious to Rosemary and me as we

come back

Bay Area after some time away and talk to city heads. People are getting more proficient at the art of ecstasy, at
to the
It's beautiful that the proficiency is not or conventional. Each couple is developing its own stereotyped ritual and aesthetic style of play and display, and communication

the art of turning on.

of course becomes

much more

subtle.

These are the factors which

determine your tribal group. Each tribe has its style. There are all these different yogas that can get you high or that can be used to

channel the evolving energy.


Different tribal groups

do

it

in the

them.

You

get interesting conflicts here.

way that comes natural to Of course, sex is always

a center of tension. But in the hedonic age, the conflicts are not

much over money. The conflicts are not so much over status and power because psychedelic people tend to be hipper than that. The conflicts tend to be at Level Four and Level Three. The
so

worst hassles and


hath no fury

flaps that

Rosemary and
is

have seen
diet.

years of living with psychedelic groups


like a

over

in many Whew! Hell

macrobiotic person scorned.

As communication levels get more complex sensory and somatic and genetic the frictions emerge. The tribal group, based on the stable male-female union, each couple with its own house, tends to allow more variety.
Let

me

give

you an example.
five

We

only saw two

fistfights in five

years at

Millbrook

years in

of every race, nation, creed,


illumination

which thousands of natty people and state of psychotic or heavenly


talk

wandered up and turned on. You


hit

about

elec-

trons! In five years, with all this energy exploding, the only

two

times

we saw anyone

anyone

else,

it

was

a vegetarian hitting

a carnivore. We're not against vegetarians. There are certain times


in the right fresh place

when we have taken


214

the vegetarian trip.

The Berkeley Lectures

You can

get very, very high that w^ay. But again, the tremendous

chemical differences betv^een bodies urge us to be cautious about coming on too strong about food rules. Psychedelic conflicts be-

come stylistic and yogic, rather than economic and material. One of the most important aspects of the nev^ society is the raising of children. At least fifty percent or more of you will have children. How are you going to bring them up? Where are you going to raise them? What does a child mean to you? Is parenthood something that you learn from Dr. Spock how to bring up a well-adjusted person? What does it mean to be a parent? This
is

the big issue that psychedelic people are facing.


is

It is

the key

issue in the psychedelic age that


It

upon

us.

seems inconceivable to us that anyone would ever bring up

a child in a system of compulsory state education. That's really

absurd.
forces

When you

back away from society you see that the

state

you

to send your child to a government-run, tax-supported,

state-approved institution.

And you

realize that that

is

blatant

1984 brainwashing.

Of

course, compulsory education

was

originally a liberal at-

tempt to protect children of poor people


kids go to

who would make

their

work

in the rich

man's factory.

compulsion is meaningless. In fact, if you don't send kid to the man's school, they'll come and bust you. Sending your

Today,

this

a child to a public school is just turning over the two-billion-yearold nervous system of your Buddha-nature baby to a first-grade

mind-control teacher.
I

don't

want
and
I

to put

down
little

first-grade teachers, because they are


I

in the revolution, too!

Rosemary and

were
It

at a teachers' college

recently,

like a tough assignment to raise the hedonic level of a teachers' college, but

was

apprehensive.

looked

we

resolved nobly to do

it.

started

making comments.

said,

have the phenomenon of the pot smoking principal." And you know, they all cheered and laughed. I thought that was encouraging. Be assured that the
"Well, in the psychedelic future, we'll

215

TIMOTHY LEARY
teachers of your children will be turned
that the public schools won't be as

on and turning on, so ominous then as now.

But in any case, the education of children, the unfolding of children, the opportunity to be present while the child blossoms
into youth,
is

to turn
to

it

over to an impersonal stranger.


it

such a rare treasure that you certainly don't want You want to be there

Now, in the tribal commune, of course, you have lots of children. You have the male-female unit and children coming along and each family has its own house. It's a beautiful
develop.
place for children to

watch

grow

up.

We

are literally producing a species of mutants. These kids are

just like

no other kids described

of you

who

in psychology textbooks. Those have seen these children will know what I'm talking

about.
first place, there is an increasing tendency to treat pregnot as a disease, but as an aesthetic and spiritual experinancy, ence. This means that the child is consciously conceived, usually

In the

at the highest point of illumination in the parents.


is

The pregnancy

seen as a nine-month preparation for a great spiritual celebra-

tion.

Not only

the mother, but the father,

all

the friends, are con-

tinually aware, day by day, of the growth of this impending

Buddhistic event.

When

the time has come, the mother

is

not

rushed to the hospital like a surgical case to be given anesthetics while the minor obstetrical operation is performed. The birth is seen as the highest moment in everyone's life. It is anticipated and

prepared

for. All the friends are

uals are in operation.

around. The tribal The moment of glory occurs,

religious

rit-

as

it

should,

and

as

it

last fifty

has always occurred (until our Blue Cross society of the years) in an atmosphere of ecstatic liberation.
a child
is

When
grows

born that way, the father has an incredibly


has delivered the baby himself. As the child psychedelic commune, the social reward-

different attitude.

He

up

in

punishment systems are of course quite practical and obvious. The kids and adults are just playing with each other. In the sense of

216

The Berkeley Lectures


Huxley's Island
the other the mutual adoption club.

it's

members

of the

commune

as

They get to know and aunts. uncles

The

possibilities here are challenging.

What

are

we

going to

give these kids in the

way

of vision? They've already outstripped,

by the age of seven or eight or nine, our highest fantasies. We just run out of visions. It's a very interesting challenge to be a parent
of this

We

new generation. do make a great deal

of the yoga of parenthood.

The yoga

of parenthood means that you are aware of where you are in

and your grandparents, and then as you and your wife, you and your mate, turn on, you realize that you're tracing back this network which triangulates
relation to your

mother and

father,

out and

down

into the past.

We are told that any Hawaiian could

parentage back for something like twenty, thirty, forty generations (before Christianity came over there and showed them
his

name

what

real religion was.) "Yes, I'm the

son of so-and-so

the son of so-and-so, the great grandson of so-and-so


to this island in a great canoe with

who was who came

King So-and-so." The whole

history of the tribe

is tied together. You know that you are the apex of a holy father and holy mother triangle that goes down and down and down to merge with the pre-human origins of life.

Similarly, in the
cial robots, to

yoga of parenthood, your children are not sobe put in the right reward-punishment system. They
to the future.

are your

windows

Each child that

is

born to you

is

a Divine Gift, a lookout to what's coming.


is

The

sense of continuity

very centering.

Another important aspect of


gence of
spiritual

living the

hedonic
life

life is

the emerlife

ritual. Ritual is to the

hedonic
is

or the inner

of
is

growth

as the experiment

to external science. Ritual

the

way you channel the energy flow to get higher and higher and higher. Ritual is the system that will allow you to move your
hedonic index at
If

will.

you use

ritual to

will, that is control

change other people's hedonic index at your or magic. That's laying your spiritual trip on

217

TIMOTHY LEARY
somebody else. Ritual is supposed to be free so that participants can expand in the direction that seems right to them. Ritual is a game sequence of behaviors and costumes and arrangements and furniture defining the ways you rhythmically arrange your time and space for hedonic and spiritual purposes, not
for secular purposes.

Let

me

give
I

ago, and

you an example of ritual. I was in India a few years went to visit one of the men I think is one of the great

gurus of India. You've never heard of him. Most of the great gurus don't want followers. They hide themselves in very inaccessible places.
It's

very hard to

know about them


Sri

because they

don't advertise.
I

You have

to find them.

remember

visiting this

man named

Krishna Prem

who lived

in the
in.

mountains way behind Almora. They had just put a bus Before that, you had to walk about twenty miles from the

nearest town, which

was

itself

about two days travel from about


rituals.

New
been

Delhi, in order to find him.

He

told us

some

interesting stories

He had

an orthodox Brahmin, and you know that really can get pretty uptight. He told us that once some sincere pilgrim came into the
temple and was wearing leather shoes and
big flap
for three or four days to
it

threw them into a

and they had to close the temple and purify everything undo that. Or another time, a well-

meaning student came and washed the dishes when the monks were out for a walk. He didn't know that the dishes were supposed to be washed to touch that food.
Sri

in a special

way. This food was not supposed

Krishna Prem told

me

that they eventually realized that

much

of that canned ritual

was

a drag!

It

was

just

making us

Sri

Krishna-Radha

Krishna Prem: aka Ronald Nixon, this disciple of Sri Chakravarti led the cult of Almora. According to Leary, Prem believed that "il-

lumination comes from intimate daily contact with fellow-searchers, rather

than from personal submissions to a master."

218

The Berkeley Lectures


uptight, and it was making everyone else uptight. Gradually Sri Krishna Prem and his friends began to refine their living on this mountaintop in such a way that the ritual was all natural. It was
just the best, easiest style to

do anything that you have to do


and pure and
direct

anyway.
Ritual
cizing
is

the

most
to be

aesthetic

way

of eroti-

what has

done to stay high. Ritual begins to revolve

around the basic natural sequences, like getting up in the morning and bathing. A great thing in India. The devout Hindu goes down
to the
ritual,

Ganges and he bathes


because
it

in the

morning.

Now that's a far out

satisfies

needs at

many

levels.

was very interesting to dig the ritual that Sri Krishna Prem, after 40 years of hedonic science, had developed on his mountaintop. We went to the temple and I sat down and I was prepared to be very solemn, and suddenly, right next to
In this case,
it

me

were only four or five lovers in this ashram, they didn't have a lot of people) an incredible noise started going
(there

BA-BOOM! BA-BOOM! BA-BOOM! One man beating two drums: BA-BOOM! BA-BOOM! BA-BOOM! And there was another cat on a big triangle CLANG! CLANG! BA-BOOM, BA-BOOM, BA-BOOM! CLANG, CLANG, CLANG! They really did blow your mind. In fact, it was like a
more advanced Jimi Hendrix, right? Then, when you got dizzy, you just had to flip out on that sound trip. The vibrations in this
small temple were overpowering. Suddenly, Sri Krishna Prem bounced in. He was about six-foot-two. And he began lighting incense, swishing the bullock's tail to dust up the scene, doing his
chant.

BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, CLANG, CLANG, CLANG and the chant, and the incense going, and he's sailing

around doing things and chanting, grinning and smiling. And this whole thing took about five minutes, and he took the candy for
Pra-San and said, "Here, take some." And that was all. What we're really talking about is the erotization of routine.
There's just no excuse to ever work.

You can do

anything you

219

TIMOTHY LEARY
want.

You can make

a million dollars as long as


off.

it's

an erotic

sequence and doesn't turn anyone

There's no excuse to do

anything that isn't charged with your loving, erotic energy. There's no reason that any acts of your day should be dull routine.

You know,
by
ritual.

holy, erotic ablutions.

brushing your teeth, or taking a bath, or dressing are As a matter of fact, that's what we mean

Slowly, precisely, in rhythm with what's right for you


ritual. It's
all

and

her,

emerges your

not necessarily based on anyone


here to learn. We're
all

else's ritual.

Of

course, we're

here to

teach each other better ways of getting high. There's much to learn from each other in the way of rituals, in the way of making
aesthetic the routines of
life.

But

it

really has to be

done by each

family unit. These things cannot be slavishly borrowed. When it gets down to the smallest details in life, everything becomes eroticized.
I

remember when we were down


their
little

visiting Steve

Durkee and Bar-

bara. They're a Libra-Taurus couple in

New

Mexico.

And

they

were building

community there. The layout of the building was something they had meditated on and had given a great deal of thought to, so that the shape of the building came
tribal

out of their deepest genetic impulses. They weren't just slapping up quick housing units. It had a certain round shape, and it had a certain thunderbird-like Indian form.
It was interesting, the way they were building it. They were using adobe, and some of the Pueblo Indians from Taos came up

DNA

to help. Steve told


brick, while he

me

that every time an Indian

was doing it, patting it a little chanting prayer of blessing for the house that the house be a house of joy and peace for everyone who lived there. Now, I submit that a house that is made that way is more likely to turn
you on than a house
tantly
that's

would make a and shaping it, he was

made by union

carpenters

who

reluc-

work

at

union wages.
illustrations that
I

There are endless anecdotes and

could give

220

The Berkeley Lectures


about the way the drop-out hfe can be an increasing sequence of communication and hedonic accuracy. In closing, I would

erotic

chant you a prayer that has come out of our recent meditations. It's called "You can be anything this time around":
like to

You can
Like
it

be anything this time around

or not, you're

God

You can

be anything this time around


this

Any energy You can be


and
light, this

time around

the sun, this time around

Rise in the East, spending the whole day radiating

warmth

time around

You can be the moon, this time around Shining down silvery light on the upturned
and
lunatics

faces of lovers

You can You can


In

be moonlight this time around be ocean this time around


tidal surges,

and out of

watery mother

this

time around

You can You can

be earth, mountain or valley, this time around


be anything this time around

You can
I

be any one this time around

suggest that you settle for nothing less than

Godhood

this

time around

Why
God
ing

not be Krishna this time around?


of Love with flute and body paint and bare feet turnriver this time

on the cowgirls by the on your leopard

around?

Or why not
Lie

be Shiva this time around?


skin, joined in ecstatic

union with

Shakti this time around?

221

TIMOTHY LEARY
You can make music this time around You can make beauty this time around Why not make it a beauty trip this time around?
Of
course,
it's

possible that

you could

get

hung up

this

time around

You've done

it

before

You know
form of

the statistics, according to the

Hindu myth,
call the

we've had 8,432,000 incarnations at what they


life

lower

before

we

got to be

human

beings
as

Then we've had those 200,000 incarnations


ings

human

be-

Been through so many

in past time

around

You can go on
Try to get
your very
it all

another power
controlled

trip this
it

time around
up, you
this

and hook

know,

in

own reward-punishment

system

time around

You can become very, very powerful this time around You can become heavy law-enforcement, establishment,
full

professor, chairman of the Board,

Nobel

Prize this time

around
But you've done that before

You can

be anything this time around

You
But
I

could be the high priest of


don't

LSD

this

time around

recommend

it

Make it a beauty trip this time around You might even goof it this time around
Try not to goof it this time around I'm sure you won't goof it this time around

Why

don't

we

all

make

it

this

time around?

222

The Hedonic Revolution

WANT TO ANNOUNCE RIGHT NOW, RIGHT


higher tonight than
I

IN FRONT,

THAT

I'M

was two

nights ago.

(Applause.)

understand that the name of


School.
I

this

temple

is

the Martin Luther

King Junior High motion. I think that after

think that

this

we merit this school a proweek we can say that it is now no

longer a junior high school, but a full-fledged high school.

Because a great deal of energy is being released these evenings we're meeting here! You can sense it, the pulse and the beat. It's

happening

all

over.

The energy is building up. Last night, Rosemary and I went over to a spiritual gathering in San Francisco at the Fillmore West.

A Synaptic Festival. There must have been a flu epidemic or something because I've never seen so
It

many

pills

being taken in public.

must have been preventative because the healthier looking people were taking the pills. In any case, after awhile, a tremendous

amount of energy began developing in the Fillmore. None of us had ever heard the Grateful Dead play quite that well. After they finished their first set, there was that precise moment of an open
223

TIMOTHY LEARY
it happened like we know it's going to continue to hapone of those pen epic, heroic moments when Don McCoy, guru from OompaH, stood up in front of three or four thousand people, with floodlights down on him, stark naked.

mike and

And

he just laid the word out and said, "I'm God.


to

How

did

come? With suspenders and garters?" This is always a very pregnant and crucial moment. It's a very hard thing to pull off. You've really got to feel it and it's got to

you expect me

God
up

be righteously there because you can't diddle around with this energy. And some of my best friends in the past have gotten
in public,
it

naked, and announced that they were God, and

often

hasn't

come

off. So,

when we saw

this

happening,

we

were

Don, go. Go, baby, go, right! Yeah, come on!" There was nothing you can do except pray, and, of course, he's questioning, too. Because we all know how it is:
then he began talking a loud and then he looked around a little scared and then
"Is this the right
it.

all

there with him: "Yeah, go,

time?"

And

little

too

Big Sur Om. And then we picked up a then a Mendocino County Om, strong and then suddenly you could feel the energy of about a thousand people just know-

we heard Beach Om. Laguna

And

it should happen. And it kept building up and building up and pretty soon there was a man standing next to him naked, and highly-charged electrons and protons were swirling, and a girl walked up naked. It was kind of going along

ing and wanting that

that

way
in

nice, easy,

Garden of Eden

stuff

and every time one

would

falter,

through
nicely.

someone, some voice, some group would come the audience. It was going back and forth, building up

And then the bouncer walked up in a very gentle way, because he has to deal with at least three naked messiahs every night
announcing they're

God

at the Fillmore, right?

Or you

money

back.

mean

that's

where

it's

at these days.

get your So he's gently

ready to take

this possibly divine

person out, and at that moment,

an interesting thing happened.

Bill

Graham somehow had to make

224

The Berkeley Lectures

And he nodded to the bouncer as if to say "lay off" and the bouncer moved back. And the Om started coming stronger and then, the guy who was kind of in charge, it was his show, it was the Don Hendrix show, right? Because there was God copping his act and his microphone and he put his arm around Don McCoy and
a split-second decision, like,

Was

it

real or not?

woooo!

pretty soon there were five or six or seven or ten people

touching.

standing there in a group. Were they touching? No, they weren't I don't know. The energy was pulsing. And the audience

by
I

this

time was on

its feet.

was

talking to a reporter
Bill

from Rolling Stone magazine today


riot

and he said that


danger of a
as high

Graham probably knows more about


was The only danger was
that

control than anyone in the country. Although there


riot there.

really

no
get

we wouldn't

we know we can
riot

in those circumstances.

The whole

but I'd just like trip. Violence is violation to the body of another living creature.

and violence thing is a scam. You all know that for a minute to take you on the violence-is-a-scam
Is it

Now

what
it

is

a violation?

eating

it?

Not

necessarily. Is
is

it

poking

or destroying

it?

Not

necessarily. Violence

doing

something to the body of another


ture that isn't

being or another creanaturally built into the two-billion-year-old natural


interspecies

human

game of fang and claw and virus and antibody. The game is set up beautifully. Balanced. Fair.
Violence
is

something that breaks the

rules. There's rules:

only one
kill

thing that causes violence


at a distance.

and breaks the

machines that

You know,
into a fight,
if

a black beating

we're led to believe from the paper that violence is up a white. If a white kid and a black kid get
well, kids will be kids.

and the white kid wins,


it's

But

the black kid wins, well, then


. . .

a racial problem.
is

As

for vi-

olence in the high school

well, fistfighting

not violence. Vikill


is

olence

is

the possession or use of machines that


this definition

at a distance.

According to

of violence,

who

violent?

Who

225

TIMOTHY LEARY
owns the machines that kill at a Government plainly is the most
Air Force and the
chines.

distance? Well, the United States


violent agency in the world.

Navy and

the

Army

possess the violating

The ma-

And
and

then, of course, there's the federal, state, county, city

Add it up. The government employs 99% of About one percent of the violent machinery is in private hands the gun buffs. But they are coincidentally the most patriotic of the citizenry, thus you can righteously say that
police
sheriff.

the violent people.

all

violence

is

government-approved,

government-sponsored,

government-paid-for.

Of

the so-called violent groups that

you read about

in the

headlines,

young people or black people, actually there has never

been two groups in world history quite as good-natured as our blacks, and our young people. Dr. Hayawatha in one of his great
semantic flourishes
this

we're going to give him a merit badge for

you want to know who is playing the Hitler, we ask the question, "Who's got the guns? Who's got the jails?" The blacks and young
if

one

said there's Hitlerism

now on

the campus. Well,

people don't. And I trust they never will. Discussions about psychedelic marriage and sexual freedom are

always good for a release of energy. I want to say again that when we're dealing with the release of erotic energy, there are no universal rules.
It's the point of living. It begins as soon as you catch on to the energy game and learn about where erotic energy comes from and how it is distributed and how it blossoms naturally and

how

it is communicated and transmitted. Try every possible way. Don't take anyone's system for doing this. Don't follow any religion based on someone's sexual neurosis, for God's sake. Keep

experimenting, keep open, and


will discover that the

suggest that sooner or later you


is

magic number

either

one or two. Or some

combination thereof.

Now,
that
I

nothing

I've said in the past

should be construed to

mean

advocating or not advocating the use of dope. I do feel that the basic issue of the Aquarian Age is dope. By dope I mean

am

226

The Berkeley Lectures


which change consciousness. Extraterrestrial intelgonna send a spaceship down and they will say, "Hey,

the chemicals
ligence
is

one species down there now that's caught on. Yeah. They've figured out that they can open up the hood and start playing around with the interior workings of the machine, the
yeah, there's

nervous system. At that point, the species mutates.


is

A new species

defined.

Dope has always been taboo in any culture, and it's got to be taboo today. Dope has always been the carefully guarded Sufi,
Rightly so, because chemicals which change consciousness just demand a new higher game. Atlantis fell because they misused dope. It's a much higher-level

Pythagorean Atlantean

secret.

game than

those based on the assumption that


his

man

cannot make

up and re-make up
present revolution

own
is

mind.

Therefore, I've said before,

and

repeat, that the key to the


is

which

the hedonic revolution, which

the

revolution of individual freedom and pleasure

the key to

it is

dope. And I'll even put this quantitatively. The speed of the revolution and the beauty of the revolution is exactly proportionate to the number of gamma consumed per square mile.
After eight years of observing the scene and seeing every possible

consciousness,

posture and attitude toward chemicals which change your I must say, flatly, that those people who have seis,

riously continued to follow the psychedelic yoga, that

a full-

blown death-rebirth once a week, are the people that are continuing to grow and expand and to blossom more obviously and apparently than any other group.

communes where people follow this yoga, everyone knows that, on Monday, John goes up to the mountaintop or he goes down to the waterfall or he goes out to the desert or he goes down to the beach or he just disappears somewhere for 24 hours
In

and does

it

and comes back changed. So you don't quarrel with

John on Friday, you wait until Tuesday. This is a demanding, taxing yoga, and it does require that you change your style of life

227

TIMOTHY LEARY
to keep

up such a pace. But it is being done. And the results are awesome. It's being done, of course, in tribal groups. I didn't have enough time last week to mention some of the

very important things that

moving, as

McLuhan

which

tribes are

group of people

we must know about tribes. We are says and as we all sense, into an era in going to be much more important. A tribe is a who share a way of turning on together and a
it's

communal

spiritual lifestyle. If there's anything that's

keep us from becoming an anthill robot society, sciousness.


It

going to tribal con-

doesn't

make any

difference

what the
tribal

tribe

is

as long as

it

obeys the million-year-old rules of


Let

life.

me

give

about

tribal

you some examples of some tribes. Then I'll etiquette and tribal consciousness and how to

talk
rec-

ognize a tribal person and


at that level.

how

to respect

him and

deal with

him

Synanon

is

a tribe.

Synanon

is

a tribe run by

Chuck Dederich,

who is the chief. Now, you may or may not like their style. You may or may not like Chuck Dederich. You may not want to spend
time there, but you have to recognize that there is something really powerful happening there. That hundreds of people tend to
orbit into small

And

communal living groups around this tribal model. works. just The Mafia is a confederation of tribes. We are led to beheve
it

that the Mafia

was wicked because they rake

off

hundreds of

thousands of dollars until they get enough money that they then can put into Wall Street and do it on the million-dollar level leI think that you will find that the Mafia has probnever threatened the life or the limb or the harmony or the ably hedonic level of anyone in this room. It's only if you get into their then you'll discover that IF territory and start muscling in

gally. Actually,

such a thing as the Mafia the Mafia.


there
is

that there IS such a thing as

To

bring

it

closer to

home, the

Hell's Angels are a tribe.

Now,

228

The Berkeley Lectures


you may or may not

like their tribal style, their

ways of

getting

high, their justice, their

ways

of interpersonal relationships, their

sexual habits. Well, too bad. They're not asking you to join their tribe, because you probably couldn't. But one thing about the
Hell's Angels (by
perfect) ... by

and

large, of course

tribal

members

are not

and

large, the Hell's Angels aren't going to

come

up
sle

in

your neighborhood and come into your apartment and hasyou, if you understand that they are a tribe, that they have

their

own

ritual, that

they have their leaders, and their


that

own

turf.

Tribal etiquette

demands
is

and who the

tribal

you know what you're getting into spokesman is, and the etiquette of establishing
extremely important and will become even

relationships. This

more important
Let

in the future.

you another example. Was it last Easter when the hippies went down to turn on with the Hopis.'* The hippies and the Hopis. The hippies expected that the Hopis, being turned-on

me

give

Indians,

would

just

groove

hippies were balling in

Haight-Ashbury style. So the front of the shrines, and so forth, and, you
in the

know, tension developed. "Well, man, those Hopis are


square cats, those Hopis."

uptight! Yeah. They're really

Well, there are exquisite, detailed, tribal rhythms, and ways of communicating. And the robot man, the man who believes that

you can walk

any barroom in any street in any country and same guy there to talk to you, drinking the same "I'm from Texas, where are you from?" he drink, you know has no concept of what tribal consciousness is. And what tribal
into
you'll find the

etiquette

is.

The other
brotherhood.

alternative to the tribe

because the tribe does tend

to be a plus-minus charge, male-female centered

group

is

the

history has given us impressive magnificent illustrations of brotherhoods of men who get turned on or caught

Human

up by some new sacrament or method, and they want to go beyond themselves, and they form a brotherhood. The Catholic

229

TIMOTHY LEARY
Church was such a brotherhood. The unfortunate thing about
such brotherhoods
is

that they generate so

much

strength that

they tend to expand and they get larger and larger the Knights Templar, and the Jesuit Order, the Franciscan Order and you

know how

that thing goes.

They expand because

the brotherhood

notion doesn't have the built-in

tribal, familial, individual style

same way, and crossing themselves the same way." Yeah, sure. But the brotherhood as a small group of men seeking to do it together, still is, and will
limitations. "We'll get everyone facing the

remain, a tremendously powerful alignment of energies. I'm now discussing aspects about dropping out and living the

turned-on

life

which

didn't get to mention in the lecture last

week. Let's talk about money. Money is an extremely irrational topic in our society. It's more of a taboo than sex these days. The

money

thing
is

is

very simple. Think of

money

as being like water.

Money
use.
If

a secondary or tertiary conditioned symbol that


if

you can

But money has got to flow. Money's no good you hold it. you hold gold, then all of a sudden you have to print paper

money. Money's got to flow. Money's got to keep passing hands. If it doesn't, it gets blocked and stagnant. It's got to keep flowing.

Money

is

just like water,

it's fluid. Its

purpose

is

to lubricate, to

keep things

tribes, among villages, among nations. Money is a liquid. Money is flowing all the time. Now, those of us who live in desert valleys know a great deal about water and its flow. The flow of money is the flow of water.
it is

moving more smoothly among

you can hold water. It is. But you've got to be coming down, and it's full of water, If hold some of it, you get a bucketful, right? want to right? you Well, then, where are you going to keep it? You get a big tank.
Yes,
true that
careful. There's a stream

Well, the problem


or
in a

is, it's got to keep flowing. If you get that water tank and keep holding it there it starts to get a money little polluted. Well, you say, there are some ways that we can get a way of screening out some of this money that's flowing

down

because

we know

it's

got to flow but

if

we can

get

some

230

The Berkeley Lectures


so that just a

way

of trapping

it

little bit

of

it

kind of

slides

over
little

to us.

We

start building a trap so

we can

funnel off just a

of that

money

that's

coming by. Yeah, build a trap.


this,

We

need
see.

about a hundred yards more of concrete to build

you

And you get very involved in


coming
and then you
is

building this trap to keep that


it's

realize indeed,

a trap!

you trap money

the

way you

trap yourself.

money The way that The whole point of


for for

money
it

is

that

it's

and you

just

and you got to know where to look come and you drill and we'll take a canteen
there

the next trip,


will tell

all right.
it

you
is

flow experiment works, even in this uptight credit card economy.


this

Those

who

have tried

Money

flowing,

righteously to the river

and any person that wants to just go down bank will find, no one's died of thirst yet.
the dropout
life. I

To my knowledge. One final thing about


that the key
is

want

to repeat, again,

space, land.
vision, the

The more grandiose your


it's

more land

you'll need, but

got to be deeded over to

God.

It's

very important to get out

of the city. It's very important to get back in rhythm with nature. You've got to do it. You know about the levels of consciousness, one to seven, and there are drugs that can turn you on to each
level.

There are yogas that can center you at these different levels, but you've got to have space. You've got to have some place in
life

your

where you can get away from the city You know, there are places within an hour or two drive of Berkeley, where you

just

walk out and you can hear silence. The hearing of silence is one of the most intoxicating psychedelic God-given experiences.

You've got to have a Level One, a Level Two, and a Level Three spot. And it's got to be close to nature, whether it's a cavern
that

you go to once a week or a sacred wood. You've


it.

just got to

have

Another thing that you'll find is that as you're living out more in nature and on the land, your relationship to animals changes. Living an urban life, the only animals we see are domestic animals

231

TIMOTHY LEARY
or the dead flesh of animals in saran

As you're

living outside the land,

wrap at the butcher store. you become animal. I talked


and
tribal deli-

about neurological manners and


cacy. Well, interspecies etiquette
planet. If

tribal etiquette
is

the key to survival

on

this

any species gets out of step with interspecies harmony, trouble is there. Take, for example, the dog. Now, many city dwellers have known dogs. Perhaps you've had a dog of your

own. But unless you've spent some time out


of animals, you
his

in nature

with a

lot

may

not

know

that the average

dog

ain't

dog

thing. He's doing

your master thing. The

city

dog

doing is an

appendage of the human personality. If you live in a ranch, or a farm, as we do, where there are about 25 dogs, they're all free and moving, it's a whole different social dog trip. You discover
that dogs are little people. They've got their personalities. As a matter of fact, the more you study them, the more you're learning

about yourself.

All right.
sion:

will

now

proceed to the topic of


is

this evening's discus-

The Hedonic Revolution. That


which
is

THE

revolution.

It's

the

only
the

issue. All the other conflicts are distortions or perversions of

the real issue

the hedonic gap, the hedonic conflict, and


is

way

the revolution

being

well,

it's

not being waged

with the
It's

way

it's

being experienced, with the

way

it's

evolving.

quite different

from the

old-style political revolution.

The

old-style revolutions were concerned with space: Capture the Basliberate the quadrangle in front of the administration tille,

building, rights

Get the dean's


is

office, rights

Get the 59th parallel

The revolution today

waged

by the radiant smile.

Do

not

underestimate the importance of the orgasm as a revolutionary


tool. It's the activist thing.

We're moving into a new

era, a

new

age. In order to occur, there has to be a polar confrontation

which

shows up the absurdity of the old system. And it has to be made more clear how absurd it is. The problem of running a university

232

The Berkeley Lectures


seen as the existential impossibility of running any bureaucratic

is

institution.

The

liberal position is that it's


all this

unfortunate that the extremists

are causing

the activist's

confusion on the campus. Well, the extremists, militant role, is to show how absurd mass compul-

sory state education systems really are. Reagan I'm not sure about whether Reagan's an acidhead or not Reagan spelled backwards is Nagger. The tactics in the revolution, the hedonic revolution, are very different

from the old-

style labor union tactics of the 1930s. Because the aim isn't to get control of the university. We don't want our union running the

saw what our labor unions did when they got power. The activist had to climb on stage and carry the farce to
university.

We

the ultimate point of violent martyrdom.

Now

someone's got to

do

this.

You have

to have police brutality

and brutalized martyrs.


be hung up than the

The young

activist,

though,

is less

likely to

brutal guardsman, because

when

the law enforcement people get

through hitting you over the head, they have to go back to the same brutal system. But there's a probability that the young activist

or his playing out that particular part which

can get turned on that night. Which means that his activism, all of us have to play

do it better, with more of a flourish, and then he'll leave the scene gracefully to move on to the making of a new society. The universities just can't go on the way they are. The turn-on
for a short period, will be seen accurately. He'll

drop-out philosophy
the establishment.

is

nicely set

When

up as a paradoxical Koan for Rosemary and I moved to Laguna Beach

going to be

was a little flap in town: "Well, there's more drug-taking in Laguna Beach" if that's possible "now that that terrible man and his wife are here." And so had a meeting in one of the boards of education in Orange they County. They were going to pass a rule saying that, from now on, any student that was caught with grass would get expelled. So they were going to run that through very quickly. Then one
a few years ago, there

233

TIMOTHY LEARY
of the board

members

said, "Well,

if

we

expel them, wouldn't

we

be forcing them to drop out?"

you know, isn't actually a revolution. The metaphor should be much more geological. It should be, pardon the temperature inversion, like an iceberg. There's this enormous
revolution,

The

center mass of

human

consciousness which kind of drifts back


poles.

The activism on the The main surface, which at is this human consciousness any one time thing global is slowly, slowly gravitating slightly toward the warmer, slightly toward the colder. The question is, which way is it moving, and are we in tune with it? And what role do I want to play in relation

and forth between cold and warm

SDS

activists

and the

police, that's not the issue.

We, the white middle-class Christians, two thousand years of repression we've laid on the rest of the world. The reaction is happening now. The move is toward black, and the move is toward non-Christian forms of physical worship. It is moving slowly that way no matter what we do about it. The only revolutionary act is, of course, just to keep getting high, and staying high, and getting higher. The way it works is that each person that gets high gets someone around him high, and then you start a chain nuclear reaction. It's happening on every college campus. It's happening all over the world, where young people are getting together. It's moving slowly, and there will come that one point (and there's nothing any of us can do about it) when there will be that one second when the 51st percent person will get turned on and at that
to
it? It

can't be stopped.

are paying for

moment,
next
it's

at that particular

moment, everyone
at

will just laugh. Say,

New
is

Year's Eve. Everyone in the world

who knows where


at that

at

going to have a loving


it?

Right? Right? Got

orgasm Greenwich Midnight. Exactly

Greenwich Midnight.

mo-

ment when everyone catches on, that it's here the Garden of Eden take off your clothes, come on, take off your uniforms.
Exactly at that
that second

moment when we all when we're all together,


234

begin to laugh. Exactly at


the big iceberg's going to

The Berkeley Lectures

come swinging
ence.)

back, toward turning

off.

(Groans in the audiback.

There's no pushing the river, nor holding

it

The

real rev-

olutionaries today are not the political militants. They're part of the old scene that we're just about to walk out of. But you can't

walk out of a scene


just play the
.
.

until

it

becomes so absurd that nobody

will

game cause man, what an absurdity! The real the hedonic engineers. The dope dealers and
.

of the University of California

anymore

be-

revolutionaries are

the artists

and the

musicians.

making people feel good, making people laugh, with rock and roll, and underground cartoons, and the double-meaning songs, and anything that makes
they're turning people on,

And

you laugh. Because laughter means


It

erotic energy

is

on the way.

really does.

The revolution is going to be brought about by hedonic activism. We've got to have hedonic confrontations which show up the hedonic gaps that separate one from another. I'll make a prediction about what's going to happen.

Hedonic confrontations

must not be between man and man, like between us and the uptight cops. Guaranteed to bring everybody down. The basic confrontation between anyone
alive, is

and who wants to stay between man and machine. The machine is the enemy.

who

is

alive

The machine
high.

is

the devil.

Number

one:

The machine

can't get

Number
is

two: The machine doesn't have a sense of humor.


neither negative proton, electron, or neutron.

The machine
machine

is

The

the enemy.

Now

talk

about taboos. Check out

this slavish

worship of the

machine. The most turned on people are still hung up on the sanctity of the machine. "Why, you don't mean, you're not suggesting that
I

we

attack the machine?!" Yeah, really.

on holy guru a couple of weeks said, "Well, you know, I'm for youth and everyone I draw the line at the burning of Wheeler Hall." but turning on, I said, "Yeah, I know you were going to get the Nobel Prize
talking to a very turned

was

ago, and he

235

TIMOTHY LEARY
on Earth and they were going to give it to you on the stage of Wheeler, right?" I'm not in favor of burning anything dov^n, particularly Wheeler Hall. I think all these things
for bringing peace

around

should be kept as museums. I think you should put velvet ropes all the Wheeler Halls and let children come in and show^

them such monstrosities. Before, we had free universities. But I would say this: If I have the choice between one broken head and
Wheeler Hall, I've got to say, Goodbye Wheeler. Now, I am about to tread upon the most sacred taboo of Western Civilization. Because I'm about to suggest
really very vulnerable, because

how

the machine
if

can be attacked and immobilized. The machine,


it,

is

it

you study counts on the absolute

cooperation of a service and machine-like humanity. Think

about

it.

On March

21st at Millbrook about four years ago (we tend to

time things by solstices and times of the moon and other primitive superstitions) a group of us were at a very high hedonic level, and

we went out
It

to the road in front of the main house at Millbrook. was a private estate, a private road, made of macadam. And we had a pickax, crowbars, the whole works, and we started digging a hole in the macadam. Well, man, you know, that was really a trip because we got down one inch, two inches, three inches, six inches, eight inches, you know. There was the mac-

adam, the tar, then the concrete. So we were radioing back to our green

planet.

"Well,
^

we

haven't discovered earth yet, but keep in touch!" Right. And after about two hours of sweating, we broke through and we put our

hand down, and wow,


is

it

was

earth.

We radioed

back, "Well, this


interesting dis-

terra, believe
If

it

or not."

And

then

we made an
off, see?

covery.

you take the pickax and you just get a hole started, and
it,

you go underneath

it

just

crumbles

don't even have to do anything to the dig the earth underneath it a little, and

You know, you macadam road. Just like


will

it

go crack.
stood up and

So

we

did that for about a foot, and then

we

we

236

The Berkeley Lectures


looked at each other and
to the gate

we looked where
joined

and where

it

how Highway 44 went to New York City. And it was just so


about

went down And we Highway thought the Taconic Highway, down to


the road

44.

easy.

Now

predict that there will be very soon a cult

they should

be called terrestrials

who

will

probably have

ver pickaxes, and every


erate

member

symbolic silof this religion will have to liblittle

one square yard of earth from concrete a day. The machine can be dismantled and immobilized so simply. Because, don't forget, our one weapon against the machine and
the computer
is

that

it

doesn't have a sense of humor.


self.

The taboo

about the machine must be laughed out of the

Destroy the
liberal

machine and you liberate everybody. There was an editorial in the Chronicle yesterday, the
Chronicle.
versity of
Illinois.

The students pushed the Chronicle too far, at the UniYou know what those students at the University
They burned
all

of Illinois did?

the

IBM

library cards! That's


is

anarchy, man!
ler's

And

the Chronicle wrote. This

worse than Hit-

book burning! You can always


card? That's scared, baby!
for the students!
I

get another book, but the

IBM

Good

mean,

wish that selected bands of


every library system and

What

see, you have to examine the issue: book a piece of property? Can't we duplicate it anyway? And do we have to have things locked up that way? And where is the library game at anyway? The machine mentality has got to be destroyed, with that preis

hedonic guerrillas could do away with the cards.


a library for?
Is

infiltrate into

You
the

cise

touch of correct rhythmic humor. It's just got to feel right. You can't make too many people feel bad or we'll suspend your
hedonic engineering Now, the obvious
out of rhythm with
license.

way
it.

to immobilize the

machine

is

to just get

Because the machine's got all Americans trained to run to the rhythm of click, click, click, click, click the machine. So all you have to do is speed up or slow down. For

237

TIMOTHY LEARY
two junk cars in the Holland Tunnel morning would slow that down. Then you'd have a thousand, ten thousand irate New Jersey commuters in their cars, and they can't get through that tunnel to get to New York to work. Their hedonic index is going to be lowered. Yeah. But when you do it, you've got to do it in such a way that the
stalling

example, two people

at eight o'clock in the

car radios will be playing a message from hedonic headquarters


saying, "Ladies
as

and Gentlemen, you're being stalled for one hour a hedonic exercise. Take advantage of this hour to look around

you. Don't worry! Don't worry, because everyone knows that it's not your fault that you're late. It's always been your fault you've

been
it's

late before,

you bad boy! But

this time, it's

not your

fault,

the fault of those terrible hedonic guerrillas, so your boss will

excuse you. So take this hour that you're stalled in the tunnel. No pressure now. We're going to play a little groovy music in a min-

but look around you and wonder why you were in such a hurry, anyway. Plus the fact that hedonic headquarters has just
ute,

announced that tomorrow we're going to stop up the Triborough Bridge, all subways, and all entrances to New York, so that no
one need come to
everyone

New York tomorrow


take

to

work. So

why

doesn't

because what would hapif didn't show Take that day off that we're pen you up today? going to give you tomorrow. You'll get paid, because it's not your
just, like,

tomorrow

off,

those terrible guerrillas that did it. Take the old lady out for a drive around Yonkers or Westchester and maybe you'll never drive into New York again."
fault. It's

Hedonic
ter or

tactics are actions


little

which make everyone


I

feel a little bet-

laugh a

more.

think that four or five creative

men

could get together and could uplevel the American economy, by

going right to the vulnerable funny bone, where it just becomes so ridiculous. I could give you many illustrations of how to do this,
trampling a lot of taboos. For example, the taboo about money.

238

The Berkeley Lectures


some psychedelic engravers who will just print up about ten billion dollars worth of money. I mean, you can make money. The technical problem
I

Well,

want

to suggest that there are going to be

of making
first

time

money is just so that it looks real, you see. But for the in human history, you see, instead of counterfeiting money
aesthetically, to give
it

money

for profit, you're printing

away. Now, once you start thinking about that, and do it on a small level, it throws the whole economy into reverse. You see,
the problem used to be of getting money. But there
if
is

a problem,

you have ten


it?

billion dollars in five-dollar bills,


It

how would you

get rid of

Right?

requires

more

aesthetic genius to get rid of

twenty

billion dollars

than to make a hundred thousand dollars.

We

money and have our hedonic guerrillas going around dropping it. Of course, the first place you take it
start printing

would

because the middle class neighborhoods would be uptight take it down to the poorer neighborhoods, because they won't ask any
question, right? Just lay about a hundred million dollars in any
in

neighborhood

Oakland, right? Then the

man would
it.

say that

any poor person that has money can't spend


interesting. Because the paradox, the

That would be

humor

of this starts becom-

ing a
the

little

clearer to everyone.

We want to get the old money and


knows what's what anyway.
their banks. See? Instead of

new money

flowing so nobody

So we've got to get our money into

bank robbing, the problem is, how do you get a billion dollars into a bank? You see? The more you think about it, the more
problem becomes. Another thing about money, it's such a taboo that the Red Russians, Marxian socialists, and the Wall Street capitalist Amerinteresting the

icans are in agreement.


it,

We've got the

technical

know-how

to

do

man.

We

print just as

can get our sputnik up faster than theirs. We can good rubles as theirs. And with all those German
Russians could

scientists they've got, the


bills,

make

just as

good

dollar

better than ours. But there's a gentleman's pact that

when
say,

the Russian

and American businessmen get together, they

239

TIMOTHY LEARY
"All right, yes,

we

fight in

Vietnam,

yes,

we

kill

a thousand a

week,

bombs, yes, antibut we each other's missiles, yes, respect money, comrade? Yes. Protect the ruble. Protect the dollar? Da."
I don't want to push your taboos to a breaking point. So I won't mention what you can do to credit cards. Then you can get whole kits of fake ID's. You don't use them yourselves. You

yes, that's all right, yes, sure, defense

give
if

them away. Now, you say, who's going to do all this. Well, we can persuade a thousand people to demonstrate and get their

heads knocked

in, you should be able to get ten smart people in one week to undermine the dollar, the ruble, or the pound. Every second of our lives we're in interaction with machines.

We're so trained by the machines that we have been trained by machines that we have trained by machines that we are not aware

hooked up to the machines we really are. As a little yogic Zen exercise, just observe any hour of any day. As you move, you are always adapting yourself to machines. It's an exercise you can play with. Just walk slowly across the intersection.
of
are

how we

Every second of your

life,

you are

either giving in to a

machine

or you're upleveling a machine.

One way

or another.

situation is always changing. The Aquarian Age is built upon time consciousness, time travel. Turning on and turning off is expanding and contracting time. It's changing every second. The problem is that your children are moving so rapidly. I think

The

that your generation

is a transitional generation. You're between the mechanical and the electronic psychedelic age. But maybe the

way
rier,

it's

going,

now

that we've broken through the hedonic bar-

every generation will be mutant.


realize that

We
reality

we

control reality, for


out.
It's

you are spinning


is,

your your television show, baby. The


keeps changing all the species. It may be that even
It

ill

or for well.

It's

question

how

big can our vision be?

time. Every generation


in

now
It's

is

new

your

lifetime,

you

will

yourself. You'll have to.

go through several species mutations not going to slow down. It's going

240

The Berkeley Lectures


requires continual giving up.

to keep accelerating.

It

If there's
it is

anything
there
is

we

learn about flow, the


little

movement

of time,

that

very

you can take with you, from one four-second


and don't

incarnation to the next.

You have
get

to be very careful about your attachments,

trap

hung up on anything that's not portable. Or that's going to you back there. Because it's moving, it's moving, and it's

good. Thank you.

241

The Hedonic Society

of the Future

BASIC

MANTRA: YOU ARE ALL GODS. TiME TRAVELERS. We,


Select

THE each one, create our own reality.


time.

our space. Select our


future.

Each of us prophesies a vision of the

very briefly what has gone turn on means to slow

Before getting into the vision of the future, I v^ant to review down in the last four meetings. The first night: psychedelic psychology. How to turn on. To

down

time so that more erotic energy

any period of time. Turning on is slowing time down. The second night: How to tune in. After you get the energy going, you've got to orbit it somehow. You've got to get hooked
develops in

up to more aesthetic and powerful structures. The third night: How to drop out. How do you drop out of the social conditioned anthill? You do it through the tribal model
and you do it on land far away from the city. The fourth night: A nonviolent revolution in which the masculine
is the enemy. The hedonic revolution. Tonight, the vision of the year 2001, a bio-geological, bio-physical temporal vision. It's a biased vantage point, but from our perspective, those peo-

ple

who

have stuck to a psychedelic yoga, that


after

their
this,

minds once a week or twice a month,

is who have blown who continue doing

month, are without any question in our minds, the healthiest-looking, the holiest, most centered people that we

month

know. And they are

all

out somewhere far away from

cities like

242

The Berkeley Lectures


putting into application the

this,

new

vision. That's

how we

see

it.

After the erotic energy

is

released, after you're turned on, the


it

problem of

what

to

do with

develops.

Tune

in.

You have

to

somehow
that
that
is
it

get into an orbit, so that

you can create some structure

large enough, and beautiful enough and natural enough

contains the energy that's increasing and growing. The structure has got to be flexible and changing and open and mov-

ing.

The energy
will go.

will

keep coming. There's

just

no end to where

you Once you


with

start turning on, the

you doing more and more energy coming, and you're not hooked up in a brotherhood or with a mate, what's going to happen is, you'll start creating waves. Take, for example, a famous rock singer. Turned-on energy. The groupie phenomenon is simply the highly
charged electron surrounded by a hundred adoring protons. Now the charge is such that when a turned-on rock and roll singer gets
that

whom

are

it? If

whole question is, of course, you turn on alone, and you get

power going and he amps high and

gets the beat

moving

behind him, then with just one little finger the whole kundalini level of three thousand people moves. The hip rock stars understand this and are worried about how to use this energy. So a

hundred groupies around one pop star makes mathematical sense. Such a love structure is not stable. But that's all right. It's all
perfect. That's the single-guru

game, the messiah game.

It

was

said of

Ramana

Maharishi, the late Hindu avatar, that his ashram

operated on a solar principle. He was the sun. He had no relationships with any individual. He just radiated that energy on

everyone
there's

who came for darshan. The energy just flowing out, and Ramana Maharishi, more and more of the energy coming,

moving through him, and he had it, he was a turned on person. He had thousands of neutrons zooming around him.

Now

the

woman who

phenomenon of the highly charged proton, or the gets more and more turned on, is really worth con243

TIMOTHY LEARY
happening and it's always puzzling, particularly puzzling to men. The girl rock singer is an example of a very turned on proton. More and more charge, more
sidering for a
see
it

moment.

We

and more energy. Then you get the Judy Garland effect. Wherever Judy Garland w^alked on stage, in the first thirty rows you had

young or middle-aged men gasping and swooning. The highlycharged proton on stage and the not-very-charged electrons or
neutrons out there.

To drop

out and to keep the male-female unit growing in a

sacred spiritual way, you do well to join a tribe. Tribal consciousness.

When
always

a person

who
is

has tribal consciousness moves through

this society,

he or she

always

alert to tribal vibrations.

You can

tell when you're dealing with someone who comes from a tribe. Because tribal consciousness kind of gives a third dimen-

sion to a

human

being.

You can

usually

tell tribal

consciousness
is

by the way a person dresses, or by the way he or she


or by his posture. There's something about

groomed,
that

can

identify. Certainly after

that you're dealing with a

you you know multi-dimensional person. Not just an

him or her
to him,

you begin talking


for his

individual

who
if

is

hustling

you

own

ego

trip.
is

Tribal ethics. Tribal courtesy. Tribal territory. This

where

it's

going to go
robot.

the

human

species

is

not going to become entirely


that

The

beautiful thing about the tribe as a social unit


is

is

it

increases variety. In a national state everyone

Frenchman and

and everyone is an American. The tribal society is small, unique, original, and always in touch with its members. Being organized around a special totem or rituals, or a
everyone
is

a Yugoslav

particular

The
trial

of getting high, it keeps its individuality. hedonic revolution is the inevitable reaction to the indus-

way

revolution.

The

industrial revolution started industrial revolution


is

two or

three

hundred years ago. The

much more

im-

244

The Berkeley Lectures


portant than the Russian Revolution or the French Revolution or the American Revolution, because they're all just by-products of
the industrial revolution, the

aim of which

wsls to turn every hu-

man

being into a machine.

The hedonic revolution aims to do exactly the opposite, to detach each human being from the machine and to bring us back to the living energy that is rightfully and genetically ours. Of
course the weapons in the hedonic revolution have to be spiritualerotic. The machines have got us outnumbered and they've got

more power than we do and they control


compete spatially with a machine.
able parts of the machine

space.

You

just can't

We

have to

select the vulner-

which

is

that the machine can't get high

and the machine doesn't have a sense of humor and the machine
can't create. That's the strategy

and

tactics of the

game.

The machine has got us all so cowed that we think of the machine as sacred. The idea of immobilizing the machine, of turning
against the machine, seems vaguely crazy, or horribly primitive.

But more and more


the machine
is

human
all

beings are catching on to the fact that

very vulnerable.

The machine counts on

the ab-

solute cooperation of

human

beings. Palestinians figure this

out

when

uring this
all

they blow up a Swiss airline. The UC students are figout They went down Telegraph Avenue and destroyed

the public instruments, like parking meters.

The

hijacking of airplanes. Great!

Men

have discovered that

if

you get on an airplane with a toy gun, you control the machine. Our vision of the world as it is will evolve. However far out it
seems,
it is

already being put into operation.


is

The

basic structure
it

of this vision
several years.

now an

actuality.

We've been

living

out for

It is
is

not altogether Utopian and abstract.

We

have

the land that

necessary to put this vision into operation.

(Baby noises) This vision, like

all

Utopian

visions,

depends on the children.

The

raising of the children. Children with Aquarian Age names.

245

TIMOTHY LEARY
Most
of the kids

we know,

their

names

are Sunshine or Star or


It's

StarUght or Krishna or Ramakrishna or Rhada.


operation.

already in

Develop your own vision. If there is one thing that is obvious about the world situation today, it is that there is a poverty of
vision. There's just

no

vision that

is

strong enough or grandiose


for us.

enough to hook up the energy we've got going


of industrial society?
it's

The

visions

If there's

anything that

we need

right

now,

wisdom of their cells visionary people, and the wisdom of nature around them and come up with a plan. It's all up for grabs. There literally is no big vision. Nixon doesn't have one. The Communists don't. A few years ago we talked to
will listen to the

who

people that were supposed to be in the visionary business.

We

knew many people in the Rand Corporation, the Hudson Institute, Herman Kahn's cult. We knew people who knew something about Communism. We kept asking: What's the vision.^ What's the future plan? What's their idea of society? Where are they going? They are struggling to survive, the Rand Corporation. Working

on

the next anti-missile-missile after the third generation.

It's

up

for grabs.

want

to

tell

you. There's no one that has

any adequate concept about what can happen. Exactly

now when
teetering

human

consciousness and the


at

human

situation

is

more
It

and uncertain than


any way. And

why

any time in recorded history. settle for less than a grand plan?

could go
think

Our

vision attempts to adjust to certain laws.

You may

of us as outlaws but

we

are obsessed with the idea that

you can

get tuned into the real laws, the laws of physics

and the laws of

biology. Build your religion, build your vision in tune with that.

Moses came down from the mountain. He had a flash up there. He saw the whole thing and the burning bush and he came down and he said, well, no adultery and no stealing. All right. But there are more ancient laws than the Mosaic and these will be our
guides as

we move
is

into the future.

Our

vision

bio-physical, evolutionary.

The

geological fact

is

246

The Berkeley Lectures

that

we do

live

on a rock, a

very, very thick rock,


it,

and then

there's

metal, and then at the core of

there's fire, the

remains of nufire

clear proton explosions. All the metal


is

and the rock and the


there
is

down

there

below

us,

and above

it

this

scum, a film,
at the

about a foot or two


film of scum,

feet of

scum. All

life lives

comes from that


bottom
life

which

is

called topsoil.

Oh, sometimes
its

of the sea,

it

may

game, the DNA Rule number one about


matter
Hfe.

be a yard of scum, but code game.

the basis of the

really living the

harmonious
it.

life is

to

understand the physics of it and the biology of is that metal and concrete and fire and

The

fact of the

electricity destroy

As soon

as

you

start bringing

scum, you're killing troleum products up, or as soon as you

up metal from below up to the some of the scum. As soon as you bring pestart laying

down concrete

and metal, you're giving up


mile by square mile
this planet.

inch by inch, yard by yard, square

this precious film that keeps life going on So that rule number one in our vision is that you have

to keep
ity

and metal and technology and machines and electricunderground. You have to let it be where nature meant it
fire

to be.
In the year 2001, everything that

we now

see as mechanical

technological civilization around us will be underground.


the year
forest

And

in

2001 the earth


does
feel right,

will be will

park again. There


It

what God designed it to be, a be deer again and foxes on Times


it.-*

Square.

doesn't

Now

it's

just so obvious.

Once, sometime in the spring at Millbrook, three or four years ago, we were building a shrine in the woods and somebody had

an ax.
go.

If

you

just let that

You know,

a seed next to

you can tell where it wants to just plunk, drop on the ground. If you drop it, you know what will happen. The seed will start
ax
fall,
it'll

going up and after ten years, that piece of metal's going to be buried underground and the tree grows higher. Let it be!
If all life, all

mammalian

life

was destroyed on
all

this planet, after

a thousand years, you

know where
247

the metal

would

be,

you'd

TIMOTHY LEARY
have to dig for
it.

It's

obvious that that's the magnetic biochemical

electric structure of this planet.


I

program

remember, Rosemary and I, and our son Jack, were on a radio in New York City, and there was a discussion about the

2000, and on this program was Hermann Kahn, the defense expert who talks about the unthinkable, the megaton
future, the year
killings

and

all that.

Strangelove acidhead. Meditate on that. But in any case, he was discussing the year 2001. Statistically, he had all the curves and graphs, and

after.

He was the man they modeled the movie Dr, He is an intelligent man, he is also an ex-

according to the way it was all going, in the year 2001 everything would be like Los Angeles. Because Los Angeles is always ten
years ahead, right?

And

it

was

interesting.
in

He

said the average


will be $49,000.

income, average income of the American

2000

He
I

could prove

it

by

statistical extrapolations.

protested that the

whole discussion was about externals

bigger rollercoasters

bowling balls. about the future,

and bigger amusement parks and bigger In the first place, the first thing that must be said
if

there

is

one,

is

that

all

technology

is

going to

have to be underground.

He said, "Hmph, underground?" One of the research team, a cripple

with a

German

accent, said,

"Well, what an original suggestion! But it can't work because it would cost too much. How would you pay for it?" Our son Jack was sitting there and he said, "Well, have every one donate $24,500 from their annual salary." The facts of the matter are that New York City is underground right now. Really.

You

could put a roof over


is

it,

and no one would know the


is

differ-

ence. Los Angeles

underground. The roof

smog.
the question, well,

Once you
what

get the

first

basic principle established, then of course

things begin to right themselves.

Then you ask

are we going to do above ground? There are not going to be any machines up there.

248

The Berkeley Lectures

We

divided the

human

lifetime.

third of

it

will be spent just

wandering around
third of
it

will

park above ground. And a be underground, where psychedelic physics energy


in this beautiful

And you spend a third of your time in time means simply turning off. Every midnight, when you go to sleep, you speed up the experience of time. Zap! Eight hours go by, and you wake up. The
research takes place.
travel.

Time

travel

daily ratio of turn off

is

one-third.

We have the clue there. We already have the possibility of doing


this.

Narcotic drugs give you a longer sleep. Right now, in Swit-

West Germany, and Mexico, there are what are called sleep clinics. You go there and you pay a thousand dollars and they'll put you to sleep. You can stay asleep for two to three
zerland,

weeks.
to get

It's

great for kicking the cigarette habit.


It's

It's

a great

way

away from your problems.


body
is

also healing, because during


tertiary

that period your

resting

and whatever abuse the

conditioning system has laid on your body, you allow the healing
to

go on.

It's

something

like astral travel in a

way.

When

your

ego consciousness leaves your body, do you die? No. Your body's damn glad to get rid of you! Now that he's gone, we can get
things cleaned up! Turning off.

When you

go to

sleep,

you wake
fresher

up,

many

hours

later,

but you

wake up younger. You're

in the sleep,

morning than you were the night before. After 21 days of you're fresher and younger than you were when you brought your ulcer in from the Wall Street office to take the sleep
So there's an interesting paradox, an interesting challenge.

cure.

When you
You

turn off consciousness you reverse biological aging. sleep for 21 days while all of your waking friends have had

that 21 days of hassle

and

tension.

They

you come back, and

you're biologically

when younger than when you


are 21 days older

went to

There are very interesting possibilities here. In the three-way system that we project in our vision there will be more
sleep.

249

TIMOTHY LEARY
and more time
not visionary,
travel for longer
it's

happening

all

and longer periods. Again, this is the time, right now. It raises fas-

cinating problems.
In the future, the basic law of

mankind

will be this:

Everyone
will.

has the right and the freedom to turn on and off at

You

won't have perfect spatial freedom. There will be hedonic computers which will determine how many traffic lights there have to
be and
all that.

There are limiting laws of space.

Two automobiles

or two auto-tube cars can't be in the same place at the same time.

Your freedom is somewhat Hmited spatially. But no one, no government, no computer should have the right to check you temporally. That's the crucial political issue of the future. Internal

yourself

freedom. The right to control your own consciousness and to turn on and to turn yourself off.
In the future,

election. Your Nixon computer won

say you are disappointed in the national computer lost. Maybe the less hedonic group, the
let's

for three years. That's

about time.

you can just go to sleep what the Aquarian Age is all about. It's That's what 2001 is all about. Freedom in time.
the election? Well,

Movement
closer

in time. Control of time. In a sense, we're

coming

and

closer to the notion of immortality as


will exist.

we get this down.


nature won't

The same problems


and time
spendthrifts,

There

will be time millionaires

and time

politics.

Human

change completely. But these conflicts, will be minimized and harmonized, and will not become as untidy as the space conflicts.

Time competitions

will not be so destructive because the issue

is

internal, invisible consciousness.

Now

want

to give

you a

specific

example of

how

life

will be

with a young couple, about to have children. Now, in our vision, children will be born on the beach. Each tribe will have beautiful cottages with platforms exin the year
start the cycle

2001. Let's

tending out over the water, in


life.

fittle
is

bays,

and they

will live

an

amphibian born in the water, because, have you forgotten? That's

When

the baby

born, the baby actually will be

how

it

250

The Berkeley Lectures


was.

And

the

first five

or six years of the baby's Hfe will be there


will look like

on the beach. Amphibian. The baby


will start to

an amoeba.

It

swim

before

it

walks. During

its first five

or six years,

the baby will consider land to be like a place


irrelevant games.

you go to play

The baby
tide

will be developing,

ness so the baby will be in tune with the fish

you know, LSD-type consciousand with the whole


and getting high The baby will just

rhythm thing and

will be talking to lobsters


lot to teach us.

with dolphins. They have a


learn

how

to survive in water. This

South

Seas island tribes lived very

may sound far out, but many much like that and would be

living that

way today

if

our Christian missionaries hadn't come

over and built those square churches and brought in the airconditioning machines. These shoreline people will really get amphibian consciousness. They tell stories of those old Hawaiian

women and men,

that they really could

tell

what was going on

hundred miles away

in the ocean. It's there, available as part of

our heritage. The next five years of life (7 to 14) is lived in the forest park above ground. The child recapitulates the natural, evolutionary

DNA trip. The child will live off the land and do the mammaUan
trip
it's

and

will

spend these years

until

puberty really learning what

like to

be a fully conscious primate mammal,' on this planet.

How to
and they

survive in the forest.


will

They

will gather

and they

will

hunt

go through the agriculture thing. But

you

see, they'll

be very high, they'll be in an LSD state, really communicating with the animals, communicating with the plants.

The theory

is

simple and natural. At the time of conception,

your mother and your father's electron-proton systems literally clicked zzzzzzzzzzz. That thunderous light-flash-hit when your

mother and
ated.
trip

father's

DNA

came together

you haven't forgotten


is

that one, have you? Immediately a single-celled organism

cre-

once single cells. Then came that nine-month inside your mother's womb. We went through the whole busi-

We

were

all

251

TIMOTHY LEARY
ness: single-cell, four-cells, then early

had
little

scales.

The DNA more RNA, yeah, more


no, not too

amphibian; we had gills, we code was figuring out this whole web, a
protein,

more amino

acids, scrap the

gills

much

hair,

no

blue eyes this year, right? Well,

we took the whole evolutionary trip, that nine-month period, then we were born. In our vision, you do it a third time. You really
experience
it

behaviorally from birth to puberty. This time you

are attempting to get back in touch with your ancestors, your

primate ancestors, your amphibian ancestors, and your human ancestors. That's going to be the point of life in the future, to
really find out

who you

are,

and get

all this

ancient energy,

all

this beautifully varied

energy that you've got inside your

DNA

history brought into awareness

and behavior.

this

Then, at the time of puberty an interesting thing occurs. During period when you live out here in the overground film, the

film of

No

no machines, it's all manual. It's all oral. written communication systems, no Gutenberg printing
life,

there are

presses.

There

will be older teachers


it's

who

will be helping out.


it's

There's music but

music of drumming and

music of

flutes,

bamboo

things.

Oh,

there's plenty going on, you're going to be


ecstatic adventures.

so busy. There are so

much
But

to learn, so
fire

many delights and many trips to take.

So

and metal are considered extremely sacred, because you know, you don't want an animal running around, using fire that way. Fire is only entrusted to the most saintly person who has
been through the evolutionary cycle several times and is so pure and understands what life really is that he would never think of
hurting a living thing with fire. Some may think this life to be primitive cavemen or primates in trees, but actually it is highly evolved. When you turn on with plants, what you are doing is
conspiring with seed. Because the vegetable kingdom is not our enemy. There would be nothing that would delight the plant king-

dom more

than to build a bigger Sequoia with low branches so a whole tribe could live in one tree. You know, you're going to

252

The Berkeley Lectures


be making
all that.

it

with trees in a certain sense. Vine, you know, and

In thinking about evolution, like everything else,


define the level.

you have
is is

to

The Lamarckian-Darwinian

conflict

just a con-

fusion of levels. Both are right at different levels.

Darwin

right

when he

says. Well, a giraffe can stretch his neck higher and that's not going to affect his progeny. It isn't the but higher stretching that does it. At the level of morphology, at the level of

the body,
is

Darwin

is

right.

But at the

level of

DNA-RNA, Lamarck
all

right. There's a conversation going on

the time between

DNA
in the

and RNA.

neck there.

RNA says: You know, there's a little strain up DNA says: Okay, in the next model let's put
at this

an inch more length. So we arrive


delic genetics.

new concept

of psyche-

In the religion of

life,

the

DNA code

is

the bible.

We continually

study the

DNA

code.

What

does she want.^ Please refrain from

mind trip on the DNA code. Where is she going? What's the next move? And instead of man's mind imposing genetic structure on the DNA, we'll be listening to the DNA and
laying your

collaborating with

it. It

may seem

will be twelve years old

a little far out to you that kids and they won't be able to read and write

but they'll be so wise. Again, this is not science fantasy. We are doing this right now. We know several tribal brotherhoods right now where the parents
quite deliberately
that's a far

do not send

their kids to school.

You know,
friends of

out decision for a middle-class American. I'm not

talking about Utopia here, or science fiction, but

young

ours

who

face this question:

When

kids get to be four or five

do
di-

we

send them to school or don't we? That's really a heavy

Jean Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet Chevalier de Lamarck: This French evolutionist and author of Philosophiezoologique postulated that acquired
characteristics can be inherited

by offspring, paving the w^ay for Darwin's

subsequent breakthroughs.

253

TIMOTHY LEARY
lemma, because, you're thinking,
if

he can't read and write he's

not going to be able to read the astrology books. Do you have the guts to do that? To not ship your kids off to learn public

have the guts to do that? Well,


are doing
it

school subjects and predicates, and verbs, and all that? Do you many of our brothers and sisters
right

now. And

they're not laying

it

on the kid

either,

they're not saying well,

you

can't

bad.

They
to.

say, here's the situation,

go to schools because they're here's what we think: You can

learn to read

and write sooner or


of course,

later.

You can

try

it

now

if

you

want

typing helps out here. The Virgo kids seem to want to go to school more than the Taureans. This
is

And

DNA

not fantasy;

it's

happening with our brothers and


set

sisters right

now.

We know three tribal groups that are

up

like this.

You have

your ranch and you have your farm thing and each family has its house but then, each tribe had its place way up in the mountains
or in the valley, which is really secluded. One is way up in Montana, another is down is southwestern Arizona, where nobody
ever comes through this rough terrain.

probably hasn't been a white


fifty

man

or any

years in

some of

these places.

You have to pack in. There man in there for maybe And these tribes have maybe

a quarter of their people staying there, just living in old Indian


caves, taking a thousand

gamma
life

pure without any machinery around. It's happening right now we're not playing primitives. It's what we're designed to do. After all, the DNA code took two
rice,

some brown

it's

just

LSD every couple days, with Level One consciousness. To be


of

able to live part of your

billion years to design this

tain or in the forest,

and

body, to survive out there on the mounif you don't use it we're just going to
little

become enormous heads on spindly


that to happen? What's that going to

bodies.

Do you want
erotic charge?

do with your

254

The Berkeley Lectures

QUESTION FROM THE AUDffiNCE: What

do you do

if

you

get appendicitis, and you don't have your Blue Cross?

did your grandmother do? You figure it out. What would you do? Do you think this is an insoluble problem? Do you think that the risk of appendicitis will drive us back to become

What

an animal species?

It's

a gamble.

Oh,

it's

a risky

life sisters.

In

addition to appendicitis and hepatitis and venereal diseases, in addition to that, there's poison ivy and poison oak, and rattlesnakes.

Rosemary and
That's a
trip.

spent last

summer

in a place that every

second

you were walking outside, you had rattlesnake consciousness.


Well, the
first

thing you think

is,

well, we're going

to wipe these snakes out, right?

Danger

to the kids. Kill the ser-

how they did it last time. pents. Remember the Garden of Eden? No. Somehow or other we've got to figure out that God in the beginning put the rattlesnakes here,
baby. That's
they've been here longer than to

Oh NO, take it easy,

we have

in this valley.

We've got

somehow come

to terms with them, right?

you

just have to be aware every barefoot at night that you're sharing the valley with lethal ser-

You find out that second when you go outside

pents.

After a while you're cautious and you're careful, and it's groovy because you're not just thumping through the bushes thinking about Wall Street, you know. And the first time you've ever heard

a rattlesnake

rrrrrr

do

his thing

when

you're walking

down

mountain
encounter.

trail,

whew,

boy! That's a turn on. That's called an

Appendicitis, rattlesnakes,
pendicitis

you plan

for

it.

If

someone

gets ap-

down

in the valley, you're

going to have to hustle

him

out.

Our

brothers and sisters and the children go to doctors

when
of us

they're sick

we're not freaks and fanatics about


penicillin.

this.

Some

even shot up

255

TIMOTHY LEARY

Now

it

goes like

this.

When

the child gets to puberty 11, 12,

They can start raising a family or they can go to sleep for 10 or 15 years, or they can go underground. Typically, I think most people will want to take the evolution trip again. As parents, you're a wise twelve years old and

13, then he or she has a choice.

code has got you you've had this incredible trip. And the so horny. There's no question about it. You've got so much erotic energy going that the idea of going to sleep or going underground

DNA

computer symbols is out. You're going to go down to that beach, and you're going to start having children. It's just
to master

going to feel right to do that. So then you do the evolution

time as parents so that by the time you get to be 24, 25, 26, 27, you really understand it. You've been through it four times, once in your mother's
trip this

by the ocean and on the mountain top, and the fourth time, bringing your kids up. By that time, you have a

womb, once

yourself,

glimmering of what

your kids up, then


to sleep
will
if

on this planet. After you've brought can make another decision. You can go you you want to or you can do it again, or, more likely,
life is like

you probably want to go underground. The underground society of the future is going to be fascinating. Men will be turning on, you know, with the elements. Psychedelic
sessions with electricity, mineral unconsciousness, atomic energy.

Did you ever have a thousand-gamma sessions with a rock? There's a lot of communication that can go on. They've got a whole mineral ecstasy thing going there. Great leaps and bounds
in physics

and geological

energies.

underground tunnels from here to Moscow zip! Air-propelled. There will be space travelers out there. Telepathy. At the age of 27, 26, you won't be able to read and write. No problem. You'll go down there and they will start turn-

Oh,

sure, there will be

you on to efficient neurological learning. Learning which is hooked up to the incredible potential of the nervous system. You
ing
will learn all of

atomic physics in six weeks. Electronics will be

256

The Berkeley Lectures


highly perfected, and great scientific breakthroughs will be made. will become light creatures, masters of vibrations. The bible

We

down

there of course

is

the physics textbook of atomic and nu-

The nucleus of the atom, the proton, is an incredible galaxy and universe of energy charges miniaturized. One thing you can say about God in addition to being a musician and
clear structure.
liking sex

and flowers, God

is

a nuclear physician.

At any time, when you are underground, you have any number You can go to sleep. You can go back up and do a teaching thing on the land, teaching the DNA code thing, teaching
of options.
the

new

generations

how
is,

to conspire with seed.

parent

trip again.

Or you can

stay

You can do a down below and become an


erotic energy.

atomic teacher. That

hooking up atomic and

The time

travel thing will be interesting.

You and your

wife

may may just want to speed up time for a while, and slow down your body thing. Take twenty years off. Anyone in this room who is born, say around the year 1945, will be 56 in the year 2001. When you and your mate are 56 in the year 2001 you may decide you want to take like a 30-year
decide at any time that you
sleep.

Okay, you go to

sleep

and you wake up

in the year

2031,

right?

By

that time your great-grandchildren will be

waking you

younger than your children. Unless your children have taken a time-travel sleep trip in which case your children
up.
will be

You

may

not be there to wake you up. You'll be making rendezvous in the future

"See you around,

baby.

Meet you

in fifty years." Incredible issues of trust will deIt's

velop. Because you're asleep.

a gamble,

it's

always going to

dicitis.

be a gamble. There's always going to be the problem of appenAnd waking up in a time culture when it's all changed.

Like, the Republicans are in power. Anti-hedonic forces have

taken over. Scary. That's where the tribe comes


nition, a time unit.

in,

because the tribe

is,

by

defi-

The
been

tribe

is

a time-traveling unit.

Throughout

human

history

its

tribal

migration in space. But the tribe

257

TIMOTHY LEARY
also migrates in time. That's

trust government likes thing Hitler wanted to do was wipe out the Jews. But the Jews have got a tribal thing going that transcends national borders. Time travel

why no dictatorship tribes. You see, the first

or no insect-

threatens the dictator. Totalitarian machine people hate tribes.

The

gypsies, Hitler killed all the gypsies, because the gypsies are

tribal,

they just

move

across space barriers. Gypsies

move through
As

time, too.

The Communists don't no big national stand tribes. The tribe is the thing
a matter of fact,

like the gypsies or the Jews.


state,

no computer system can

that protects your individuality

in space,

at

you in time. Because one of have members time, you'll any your tribal family underground, you'll have members of your family asleep, you'll have
it's

and

also the thing that protects

members
You'll be

of your family
in

on the beach,

you'll

have members of

your family moving

and

out. You'll be meeting each other.

making time rendezvous. As we expand the dimensions of consciousness (and that is the purpose of life and the good of this Utopian plan) we increase the
importance of love and
trust. trust.

The

transition depends

on love and

There's the important gamble.

When you
is

go to sleep, look
trip

at

your mate, and decide, well, we're going to take a time

extremely exciting. There's always a distrust when you go to sleep. The law and order people say, we've got to have a society in which decent citizens

together. Level Seven, the turn off trip,

can go to sleep at night, right? Throughout the long millennia of evolution it has always taken a bit of doing to get secure eight-

hour

sleep.
I

You've got to have the cops on the corner. Jack Valsleep better at night because

enti said,

Lyndon Johnson

is

in the

White House. Regardless of

his limited scope, Valenti's

hedonic

point is correct. He felt better going to sleep knowing that he had a friend, and tribal crony of his who has his finger on the button,
right?
It's

a rather heavy cosmic issue.

of heroin, or course, will

The security, the aesthetics become popular. We'll have a non-

258

The Berkeley Lectures


addictive Level Three narcotic in fifteen or twenty years.

You

will

be just taking extended sleeps.


for four or five or six days.

You and your mate

will

go to sleep

not be sleep process seen as a dull, unconscious storage where you put your body in the bed like I put my car in the garage for the night. That's not
itself will
it at all. Sleep is an incredible adventure that you take with your wife or your mate or your friends. And you can plan it in such a

The

way

that things can

happen while you're

asleep.

I'll

see

you

in

my

dreams. The psychedelic possibilities of turning off have hardly been tapped and define a fascinating frontier.

The concept of parent-child


you have to get off to school,

relationships

is

going to change
creatures that

tremendously. In 2001, children will not be


first

little

grade, third grade, junior high,


if

and Oedipus problems. In 2001

you have an oedipal

lust for

mother, well, you can wait fifty years and you'll be ten years older than your mother. Hang around till she wakes up. You'd better be good to your kids, because it's your kids that are going to be

waking you up. Tribal partners, baby. You better be good to your old man, because, you know, we're increasing the time dimensions of mortality. We're not just here zip-zap do your quick
thing,

you know, condition them


It's

fast,

high school, college, junior

executive, senior executive, pension, got your insurance paid?

Goodbye.

not going to be that sort of thing anymore.


turning on and turning

It's

going to be the helical time thing

off.

You know
mendous
has
its

that

smoking a

joint

things to your time encounter.

with another person does treTurning off time travel


fiction

complex and beautiful dimensions as well. Please do not be inhibited about planning your science

future.
in this

Why not plan a loving science fiction future? Every person room has a better vision of how the year 2001 should be

than Mao-Tse Tung. Or De Gaulle. Or Nixon. I just know that to be true. So why be modest? It may well be that this has all

happened before.

When you

start playing

around

in the time di-

259

TIMOTHY LEARY
that's what all heads do) surprising things can hapOnce pen. you take psychedelic drugs you catch on to the time

mension (and

continuum.

It's

about time.
generation to figure this out in our clumsy way? generation to discover LSD? Hardly likely. I

Are we the
Are we the

first first

mean, when you look at those pyramids in Egypt. Why did they do that? Why did they have this tunnel and secret room down
there,

way

inside.

They had

this

body wrapped up, and they had

hedonic gear ready, so that when the dude woke up from his time trip, there was his wife, and there were his servants, and
all this

they were ready to do their thing again.

Now

maybe

that's just

symbolic. Maybe they didn't really do it. Maybe they were teaching us about the possibilities. I don't know. Or maybe that's what
flying saucers are.

Maybe you come back from


and you
say.

a time trip
in

and you look around

My

God! Reagan's

Sacramento! Well, don't show

yourself in public, right?

Show

yourself to people

who
in

are taking

LSD down

in the desert, right?

You know, down


is

Joshua Tree,

people and acidheads. Well, it just does create more humility, really, the time thing. You're a little more humble with your children, and you're a little
California half of the population

UFO

more humble with your

parents.

(Baby noise in audience. Applause and laughter.) You see, we've just been kicking around on the surface.

You

can get into more detail here. Details about the possibilities. Details about the practicalities. Like what are you going to do tomorrow that is in line with your vision? Because, look, don't
waste time, brothers and sisters. It's all up for grabs, no one vision is any better than yours. I don't see any great visions around. I
read the Reader's Digest, too. Come on. Don't waste a lot of time and drag on with these low-level games. Get your vision going.
There's no reason

why you

Rosemary and

are involved in such a thing.

should not start going tomorrow. We are working our

LSD

session

programs for our grandchildren. We're going to help

260

The Berkeley Lectures


them
trace

back to

us.

We're leaving messages here for the gen-

erations to come. So that they can,


.^

what going The love and trust room, in this ad hoc, five night religious cult we have going in this Junior High auditorium. You know, a lot of this was talked about by H. G. Wells. He wrote a book many years ago, and he said there was going to be

you know, keep it going. Keep and humor we have right in this

two kinds of people, the flower people, wandering around the land you know, flowers and dilated pupils, loving, and then you have the underground machine people that came out and ate the
flower people. (Pause as a message

Do you want
it?

to read
it.

OK,

I'll

read

brought up to the stage.) Well, should I read it or will you read "Tim: Here's something I wanted to send
is

it?

across to you.

New

Life order of the

Second Coming. Evolution

of the physical to superphysical. In the beginning sex was void and without form. The two parts of love, man and woman, within
the love, looked

down upon

the sex

and dug

it.

The ray of love


its

without then descended to where the sex had been to raise

own through two parts of love, man and woman within the love, with feeling, and it was so. The new man and woman are evolved by the Second Coming of One Soul dreaming through the eternal
mind
into the other soul."

You know,

there are so

many ways, and

it's

all perfect.

All

and emotions and sensing and thinking and bodying and re-incarnating. There are lawful things to learn. What determines your conditioning? What makes you
these levels of consciousness, sleep

mad? What

Learn the laws of what you're chasing and what bells make you jump to the left and right. Learn it all and go beyond that and turn on your senses and turn on your
turns

you

off?

H. G. Wells: The author of The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and The War of the Worlds was also a human rights activist who believed in free
love, progressive education,

and world government.

261

TIMOTHY LEARY
body and get the erotic energy going. And keep looking around and listening. Listen, listen to the DNA code. Listen to animals,
listen to children.

And listen,

listen all the

time to everything that's


see as

coming through. The main thing that Rosemary and

we

talk to people

is this: Most people don't listen, really. Listen. Listen to plants and listen to animals and listen to rocks and stars and listen to

your mate. And don't settle for anything less than your divinity. You can be anything you want this time around. Think big. Do it. Do it. Do it for yourselves and do it
children. Listen to

for others.

your kids, because these kids just demand something bigger and better than this anthill society. Keep movAnother ing. Moving in space. Moving in time. We'll meet again.

Do

it

for

space.

Another time. Another

star.

262

Cybersex

Platonic Love

Becomes Pretty Real

AM
I ers
I

VIEWING A VIDEO TAPE FILMED BY CYBERSPACE RESEARCHat

Autodesk, a Sausalito computer software company. watch a woman wearing tennis shorts leaning ahead expecting

a serve.

On

her head she wears a cap

woven with

eyes are covered by


tennis racquet with

opaque no strings.

goggles. In her

thin wires. Her hand she holds a metal

left and swings furiously at the empty air. no!" she groans in disappointment. "Too low!" She crouches again in readiness, then runs forward, leaps up,

She dashes to her

"Oh

slams a vicious volley at the empty air and shouts in triumph. The video tape then changes point of view. Now I am seeing

what

the player sees.

am

in the court.

The

ball hits the wall ball in a

and
low-

bounces back to

my

left.

My

racquet smashes the

angle winning shot.

Her goggles are 3-D picture of a racquetball court. She is in the court. As she moves her head orientation/direction sensors in her cap show her left, right, up the left wall, the right wall, the ceiling. The movement of the ball is calculated to reflect "real life" gravity and spin.
This
is

woman

playing Virtual Racquetball.


screens

two small computer

showing the digitized

am

experiencing the next big development in electronics.

It is

called Artificial Reality or Virtual Reality or Electronic Reality.

Some

literary

computer folks

call

it

Platonic Reality in honor of

265

TIMOTHY LEARY
the Greek philosopher

who

described a universe of ideaHzed/

imagined forms 2,500 years ago. We no longer need to press our addicted noses to the
like grateful

TV screen
on cyber

amoebas.

Now we

can don cyber suits,

clip

goggles,

and move around

in the electronic reality

on the other

side of the screen.

Working, playing,

creating, exploring with the

basic elements of reality: electrons.

developed by NASA. The idea was that Houston could use their gloves to direct robots on the moon. Architects and engineers are experimenting with an Autodesk device to walk around in the electronic projections of
This technology was
technicians in
first

the buildings they are designing. Doctors can travel

down
it's

arteries

and

veins, observing and manipulating instruments. Does this sound too Star Trekky to be real.^ Well

already

happening.

Do you remember

last

Christmas

when 600,000

American kids equipped with Nintendo Power Gloves were sticking their hands through the Alice window to move Ninja Warriors
around?

Within only

five years

(the first year of the President

Dan

Quayle administration) the market will be flooded with goggles and cybersuits for folks who want to "beam" into the technicolor

wonders of

their self-fabricated screenlands.


this

The implications of
staggering.

technology for work and leisure are

For example, within ten years most people will not have to "go" to work. You get up in the morning, shower, and then dress
suit. And you'll "beam" your brain to work. have to fight traffic in your air-polluting 300 you horse-power car, hunt for a parking space, take the elevator to your office. No more flying, strapped in your seat in a monstrous

in

your cyberwear
will

No more

toxic- waste-producing
fighting jet-lag as

air-polluting

jet-propelled

sky-dinosaur,

you attend conferences and meetings.

266

Cybersex

Tomorrow your

brain can soar

on the wings of

electrons into

the office of a cUent in Tokyo, then

beam

at the speed of light to

a restaurant in Paris for a flirtatious lunch, pay a quick ten minute

your folks in Seattle all without physically leaving your In three hours of electronic global house-calls you room. living can accomplish what would have taken three days or three weeks
visit to

of lugging your brain-carrying body like some slab of inert flesh. This is the Information Age. And the generator-producer of

information

is

your

delightful, surprise-packed brain. Just as the

enormously powerful machines of the Industrial Age moved our bodies around, so tomorrow, will our cybernetic appliances zoom our brains around the world at the speed of light.

We

won't have to travel to play.


is

We

press

two buttons and we


There to

are standing on the


join us

tee of the first hole at Pebble Beach.

your

sister

Anita (who

is

actually standing

on the lawn

of her house in Atlanta) and our dearest, funniest wonderful


friend Yoshi
in his

whom we have never met in the flesh

(who

is

actually

backyard in Osaka). Each of us in turn "hits" the Platonic and we watch them soar down the fairway. After finishball golf ing the first hole, we can "dial-beam" to Anita's patio to admire
her garden and then zap over to the tee of the second hole at St. Andrew's. And then zoom to the Louvre to look at that painting

of Cezanne that Yoshi was talking about. Within ten years, most Americans will be spending half of their waking hours zapping around in electronic environments. Any
spot in the world you can think of can be dialed up on our screen. Any landscape, surrounding, setting, or habitat we can think of or imagine can be quickly fabricated on our screen.

concerned by the prospect of human time trapped like zombies in the inorganic, plastic-fantastic electronic world. They fear that this will lead to a depersonalization, a dehumanization, a robotization of

Some

thoughtful

critics are

beings spending so

much

267

TIMOTHY LEARY
human
nature.

race of screen-addicted nerds. This understand-

is grounded in the horrid fact that today the American around six a hours average spends day passively reclinin front of the boob tube. And three hours a day peering ing

able apprehension

docilely into the

company's computer

screens.

The

optimistic

human

scenario for the future involves three

common-sense
1.

steps:

2.

To cure To end
TV.

the current apatheic, torpid the

TV

addiction.
centralized

monopoly of top-dov^n, spud-farm,

3.

To empov^er the
and create

individual to actively communicate, perform,

electronic realities.

How? By means
ing

of inexpensive computer clothing.

Another example? A married couple, Tom and Jane, are v^alkdown the Malibu beach. In material form, you understand.

Real foot-massaging sand. Real skin-tanning sunshine blue sky. On loving impulse, they decide to spend a funny, loving minute
or

two with
flip

their daughter, Annie, their lens-goggles

who

is

in Boulder,

Colorado.

They

down

which look

like sunglasses.

The

wife punches a few numbers on her stylish designer wristwatch. The husband turns on the one pound Walkman-like receiver. In
Boulder, Annie accepts their "visit" and dials them to a prefabricated pix-scene of her patio. She is smiling in welcome. She is actually in her living room but electronically she is in her electhey were they turn their heads they see Annie's husband Joe walking out waving. He points out the roses that have just
tronic patio.
there.

They

see exactly

what they would

see

if

When

bloomed
Jane are over the
dog.

Remember, at the same time Tom and "really" walking down the Malibu beach. They can look goggles and watch two kids in bathing suits chasing a
in the garden.

The four people sharing

the "patio" reality decide they

want

268

Cybersex

to be joined by sister Sue in Toronto.

They

dial her

and she beams

over to the "patio" in Colorado. Sue wants to

show them her


room.
the cost of

new

dress.

So the gang beams up to Sue's

living

It is

logical for you, at this point, to

wonder about
Is this

this transcontinental

home movie-making.

not another ex-

pensive toy for affluent Yuppies, playing while the rest of the

world starves?
Happily, the answer is "no." The equipment used by this family costs less than a standard 1990 TV set, that pathetic junkfood

tion.

spud-box with no power to store or process electronic informaThe designing and digitizing and communicating of

electronic realities cost less than a

phone

call.

In ten years, fiber-

optic wires will allow

you

to receive/transmit

more information

than

clumsy airwave broadcasting networks. And a thumbnail-sized brain-chip holding a billion transistors will allow
all

the

you

to store
will

What

and process millions of 3-D signals per minute. we possibly do with these inexpensive extensions of
is

our brains? The answer


these wizard powers to

so down-to-earth

human.

We

shall use

communicate with each other


and
richness.

at

unima-

ginable levels of clarity

To

sibilities let

help us imagine one dimension of the communication posus consider the erotic interaction. Cyril Connolly once

wrote, "Complete physical union between two people is the rarest and yet not quite real, for it sensation which life can provide
stops

when

the telephone rings."

Connolly's
"physical"
signals,

comment

is

useful because he distinguishes between

communication

bodies

rubbing

words and thoughts transmitted

and non-bodily electrically. The solution

problem is simple. Electronic appliances are beautifully cooperative and totally self-directed. Hey Cyril, if you don't want to be disturbed, just turn the gadget off when you head for the
to the
sack.

And
let

then turn

it

back on when you wish

to.

But
fers to

implication. Connolly reas "the rarest sensation which union" "complete physical

us examine a

more profound

269

TIMOTHY LEARY
life

can provide."

Is

he thereby derogating the "union of minds,"

the interplay of empathy, wit, fantasy, dream, whimsy, imaginaIs he scorning "Platonic Love"? Is he implying that sex be mindless acrobatics? A grim, single-minded coupling that can be disturbed by the tenders of metaphysical sex?

tion?

Here
day

is

a typical episode of erotic play that could

happen the

after

tomorrow. The two

lovers,

Mary and

Jerry, are per-

forming bodily intercourse beautifully with elegance and sensual


skill, etc.

They

are wearing Platonic lenses.

At one point, Jerry

touches her watch and suddenly they are body surfing 12-foot rainbow waves which are timed to their erotic moves. Sounds of
liquid magnificence, timed to their moves, flood their ears.
giggles

Mary

and touches her watch and the waves

spiral into a tunnel

vortex

down which
Mary
eagle.
is

they spin and tumble. They intercreate reality

dances
fearless

a seething volcano over

which Jerry soars

as a

While always birds sing and the earth

softly

breathes.
Plato, as
it

turns out,

was magnificently on beam. He

said that

the material, physical, expressions are pale, crude distortions of


the idea-forms that are fabricated by the mind, the brain, the "soul."

The
here

facts are that

most physical

sex, even the

most "complete

unions" are graceful motions unless enriched by imagination. And is the charming enigma, the paradoxical truth that dare not

show
really

its

face. Usually,

knows what is mind of the other. In most


minds
. .

even in the great fusion, neither partner flashing through that delightful, adorable
cases,
if

lovers could read each others'

In the future, the wearing of cyber-clothing will be as conven-

To appear without your Platonic gear would be like showing up in public stark naked. A new global language of virtual signals, icons, 3-D pixels will be the lingua franca of our species. Instead of using words
tional as the wearing of body-covering clothing.

270

Cybersex

we

shall

communicate

in movie-clips selected

from the jungles of

images stored on our wrists.

The local verbal languages will, of course, remain for intimate, non-Platonic communication. Nothing from our rich, glorious past will be eliminated. When we extend our minds, empower our
brains,

we

shall

not abandon our bodies, nor our machines.


as

We will drive cars,

we now

ride horses, for pleasure.

We will

develop exquisite bodily expressions, not to robots, but to perform acts of grace.

work

like efficient

The main function of the human being in the 21st century is imagineering and electronic reality fabrication; to learn how to express, communicate, share the wonders of our brains with others.

271

Electronic Sex

The
ize,

task of the philosopher

is

to Personalize, Popular-

and Publicize new ideas and new mind methods. To perform this function, to Personalize, Popularize,

Publicize Interpersonal Computing, I wrote the follow-

ing chapter.

THE YEAR
ital

BY ducing data and


about

1988,

MANY BRANCHES OF

SCIENCE WERE PRO-

theories about information, Space,

and

dig-

physics. There suddenly appeared a remarkable consensus

how

the universe operates


.

and where we are going

as

an

information-species

According to Edward Fredkin, the founder of Digital Physics,


the universe
is

a digital information program.


i.e.,

The

basic units of

the universe are quanta, bits of pure,

highly concentrated

information,

programmed

to flick

ON/OFF

according to minia-

turized algorithms.

According to neuro-psychologists, the human brain is a "universe" of 100 billion neurons each of which has the thought processing capacities of a powerful computer. The task of our species

{homo sapiens
igate,

sapiens)

is

to learn

how

to activate, explore, nav-

program, and re-program

this array of

computers. The uni-

272

Cybersex

verse

is

a linguistic system.
i.e.

Our

species assignment

is

to learn

how

to talk digital,

to receive, process

and communicate

in the

language of Higher Intelligences. Back in the primitive year of 1974,


puter prophet, began outlining

Ted Nelson, legendary comHyperText methods for creating

reading rooms, urban networks of invisible digital data which people could enter, via the screen, and then explore, browse, graze, mine and harvest a
libraries, archives, depositories, universities,

new

universe of information.

By 1988, Nelson's prophecies were becoming realized. Groups of cybernauts, digital pioneers, were building the mansions of data which Ted Nelson had so brilliantly blueprinted.
At the same time, William Gibson had just finished his cyberspace novels: Neuromancer, Count Zero, Burning Chrome, and

Mona

Lisa Overdrive. In these remarkable encyclopedic epics,


in forecasting the culture of the

Gibson succeeded

Information

Culture of the 21st century in the most nitty-gritty, human terms. In Gibson's future. Information is the vehicle, the currency, the

environment of
is

human

existence.

The

Digital Universe of Fredkin


cities

explored, surveyed, colonized, domesticated, built-up into of data. All accessed through the screen.

By
and

the year

2030 humans

are spending

more time and energy


side of the screen.

actively jacked into Cyberspace, wheeling, dealing, competing,

interacting in the

world on the other


I

was busy developing software with the Futique In-Corporation which empower programs along individuals to build digital models of their minds which are acAt the same time (1982-88),
cessed through the screen.

The

idea

is

to get individuals to jack-

in to the other side of the screen, plant their personal flags in

New

World of Cyberspace, and

start transmitting signals.

We

quickly ran into a familiar problem. The more attractive

our software, the more liable the player to become addicted. We were solemnly advised by Software Executives that a good program should have 40 hours of play! Now we liked the idea that

273

TIMOTHY LEARY
intelligent people would spend time interacting with our programs. But forty hours? What about the player's homelife, lovelife,

meat-machine obligations?

Solitary absorption in the pleasures of the brain-screen link

up

was understandable.
one would play with

It

was

inevitable that

when one was

intro-

duced to software that stimulated the brain with


this

digital patterns,

Great Cyberpunk heroes like Charles Lindberg, the Lone Eagle, were inspiring models of soUtary pleasure. But should Digital Pilots log all of their Digital time
toy.
in their

new

selves shamelessly

rooms, flying solo around cyberspace? Rewarding themwith auto-stimulation of the brain?

Obviously, the best use of this

new and

very attractive source

of pleasure was interpersonal. For this reason the first software program produced by Futique (Mind Mirror) featured mind interplay; sub-programs which en-

couraged users to explore minds in pairs or groups. By 1988, all of FUTIQUE'S programs were based on INTER-

SCREEN. The

Personal Computer had become, for us, the Inter-

personal Computer.
In 20 years, we expect that most of us will be spending seven hours a day actively navigating around the oceans and continents of digital data the PSYBERNETIC universe within our brains

and the

CYBERNETIC

universe behind our screens.

By 2008, no one over the mental age of five will spend much time torpidly viewing TV screens. You will edit Dan Rather's version of the news. Youl You! You! will interact with Rom-Rambo
and Rom-Cosby on your screen. But most of your time will be spent
digital-realities will

in interpersonal

computing,

the exchange of digital signals. Interscreening. Creating mutual

be the most popular and growthful form of

human communication.
Interpersonal computing does not lead to an "either-or/all-or-

none"

split

between body and mind.

274

Cybersex

Interscreening does not imply a derogation or neglect of fleshinteractions. Intimacy at the light-speed digital level enriches ex-

changes at the slower warm-skin levels. If you can't interscreen tenderly with him, how can you possibly fuck him?

You do not lessen the richness of your murmur-touch contact with your lover because you also communicate by phone and FAX and hand-scrawled love notes.
Your warm-breath should be much more
ality

interactions with your touch-feel friends

elegant and pleasant with the Digital Re-

option added.

Digital Activation of the Erotic Brain

young woman named Vicki is alone in her bedroom. She sits on the edge of the chair with her legs spread wide. She is looking intently at a computer terminal on the desk in front of her. Vicki is a novice Cyberpunk. She is using an electronic communication device for her
tional or

own

private pleasure.

Without

institu-

government authorization. At the moment, Vicki's eyes are fixated on

letters

which wiggle
is

across her screen. Vicki blushes with excitement. She

breathing not comfortable a more into She taking position, squirms heavily. her optics off the letters squirting across the screen like spermatozoa.

Suddenly the words stop.


Vicki smiles. With her right hand she begins typing letters on the keyboard in front of her.

Vicki in the Arousal

Mode

Vicki's

words now appear on her

screen:

275

TIMOTHY LEARY
OH RON WHEN WE'RE ON LINE FEEL SO BAUDY. WHERE DID YOU LEARN TO BE SUCH A GOOD TRANSMITTER? YOU DOWNLOAD SO GOOD! TELL ME PRECISELY HOW YOU WANT ME TO INTERSCREEN YOU. CAN SLIDE MY JOYSTICK IN YOUR F-SLOT? WANT TO PUT SOME LOVE-BYTES ON YOUR KEYBOARD. LIKE YOUR BIG STRONG HARDWARE. LET ME BOOT-UP YOUR MALE-MERGE FUNCTION! WHEN READY YOU CAN PRESS ENTER.
I I

OOOH YOU'RE YOU'RE SO COMPATIBLE.


LET'S

INTERSCREEN
DISK

OOOH!

OVERLOAD! MY SYSTEMS ARE CRASHING!

CYBER-NETWORKS

Vicki

is

the lust circuits in her brain.

using her computer to boot up and artfully program Her software is linked up, via tele-

phone, to the computer of a man named met well, never seen in the flesh.
. .

Ron whom

she has never

Vicki and

Ron

first

inter screened in a

computer network. They

started off quite sedately, both contributing ideas to a public-

access conference
like
.
. .

on CIA terrorism in Nicaragua. They came to each other's ideas, so they agreed to chat on a private line just the two of them exchanging electronic signals to each

other through their computers.

Well, one thing lead to another, as it often happens in malefemale conversations. At first they joked and flirted. Then they
started having imaginary dates. First, they'd select a movie. Af-

terwards, they'd select a restaurant.

Then they'd type out

their

wine and dinner orders. While waiting, they'd discuss


tions to the movie.

their reac-

Then
started

as

the imaginary, transcontinental night-on-the

town

winding down, Ron typed:

276

Cybersex

VICKI,
I'D

YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL LIKE TO KISS YOU GOODNIGHT.


I

THINK

Vicki was wasting no time typing her answer.

WHY DON'T YOU COME IN FOR A NIGHTCAP? LET ME SHOW YOU MY DISPLAY MENU.
Well, the next steps were quite predictable. Both got slowly on the stereo. Ron lit the fire.

carried away. Vicki put a record

Slowly, timidly, they started exchanging sexual fantasies, step-bystep description of foreplay, sly suggestions about what they

would

like to

do

to each other,

and what each would

like

have

done. Like most computer kids they are smart, inventive and very shy. But right now they're getting bolder and saucier.

Whew!

After fifteen minutes of this cyber-aphrodisia, they had

constructed the most romantic, elegant, sophisticated, all-out

wanton, mutual sex


disco, sloppy disco,

affair imaginable. Pre-frontal nudity.

Floppy

hard disco cyber-porn. Imagination, the creation of mental images

in the brain,

was

the vehicle of their steamy, fantastic, cyberotic party.

The Zen
Ron and

of Cyberfuck

Vicki were using the


i.e.

boon of modern

electronics to

nervous systems by means of carebrain-fuck, up fully selected signals transmitted between their computers by the
to link
their

phone

lines.

277

TIMOTHY LEARY
Highly Interactive Software

Ron and
ities

Vicki have thus become

members of

a fast-growing,

erotic network: those

who

of Cybersex.

The

secret

have discovered the intimate possibilis this: Computer screens have a

powerful, hypnotic ability to create altered states in the brain.

Two

people communicating through their computers can access

a range of brain circuits arguably wider than can be reached by

bodily contact.

This
in the

because the brain and the computer language of electric impulses.


is

work

the

same way:

The Body-Brain Relationship


Okay, no more arguments here, our bodies are wonderful! All of us, I am sure, want to improve the wondrous pleasure that come through the soft tissues and silky membranes. Tender
hands. Soft, probing fingers.
satin

Wet

lips. Soft,

curving thighs. Sweet

mounds and
one
is

No

bulging protuberances. implying that the basic hardware

is,

in

any way,

outmoded.
Hey, nothing can replace the
zling, nibbling, smelling,

kissing, cuddling, licking, nuz-

honey-moaning, fondling,
But,

murmuring, sucking, joking, smoking, biting, entering and receiving, the


exist for us only

tender exchange of love's soft bruises.

however enjoyable, our bodily contacts

as registered in our brains.

We

sense the touch

and

taste

and

perfume and the membrane softness of our lovers only in clusters of electric signals picked up by our neurons and programmed by
our mindware.

278

Cybersex

Personal Computing
People
desires

who

use computer-signals to arouse each other's sexual


in

have stumbled on the next evolutionary step

human

interaction:

Quantum
Lotus

sex, cyber-juke, cyber-mate. Multi-mate.

Info-com.

2-3-4.

Electronic

Arts.
is

Radio

Shacking?
of a

Broderbund? The Commodore,


fleet

after all,

the

commander

of pleasure craft!

Quantum Sex
has been know^n for years that people who communicate via computer-phone linkups can reach amazing levels of intimacy.
It

This was a surprising development.


columnists,

Most

respected newspaper

and conservative pop moralists had been warning that computers will depersonalize humanity, and alienate us more from each other. These media experts made the classic, dreary, conservative mistake: trying to understand and explain the future in terms of the past. Bureau-stats and managerial, their eyes firmly fixed on rearpsychologists, liberal ministers,

view screens, think of the computer as a machine. A metal product of the industrial age. Sexless. Hard. No one except certain
in the decaying

decadent, black leather, transvestite, hair-dyed, mechanico-freaks slums of factory suburb fans of kinky techno-punk

musicians like Lou Reed, Pink Floyd, Bruce Springsteen, Quiet


Riot, Talking Heads,

DEVO

Grace Jones, would think of using machines, for lacocca's sake, with
Police,

David Lynch, The

ball-bearings and transmissions and smoky, metal parts, to enhance sexual and romantic experience. If any.

279

TIMOTHY LEARY
The Brain
But the computer
electronic brain.
Is

the Ultimate Organ of Pleasure


It's

is

not a machine.

a siUcon sub-circuit of an

moment. The brain has no eyes, ears, The brain is a powerful knowledge prostrong thighs. cessor packed away in, and protected by, the bony case of the skull. The same is true of the computer, a powerful thoughtprocessor packed away in, and protected by, the metal case. Both the brain and the computer receive, sort, and output

Now,

think about

it

for a

full lips,

"ideas" in clusters of electronic on/off signals.

The

brain, lest

we

forget,

is

the ultimate pleasure organ.


if

And, the personal computer,

we know how

to use

it,

is

powerful organ for sexual intercourse.

Why?
Because

when two people

link

up

via

computers

their

"naked"

brains are interscreening. Directly. All the complicated apparati

of bodily contact: garter belts, bedrooms, zippers, bras, contraceptives, bodily parts are bypassed.
slide

Your

electronic tongue can

along the Q-links into his soft pink receivers with

no clumsy

props to get in the way.

The Embarrassing Complexities


Suppose that

of the Tissue-Ware

Vicki had met at a discussion group and started dating. First at the coffee shop. Then maybe a cocktail lounge. Then dinners and movies. The first fumbling steps at intimacy: holding hands, knees rubbing under the table.

Ron and

What to wear? The familiar mating-ground questions. place or yours? Then the complicated dance of mutual seduction. The nagging worries of the person with no more than average sexual compe-

My

tence.

280

Cybersex

He

thinks: Shall

make my move now?


if I
I

She wonders: Will he think I'm a trollop Is she smart? Is she pretty enough? Can
like to

grab a handful?
it

get

up? Does she

transmit head? Receive head?

300 or 1200 baud?


she hip enough? Too hip? Handsome enough? Can he he boot me up the way I want it? Can up?
Is

get

it

Who Who

is is

this

guy anyway?

this

dame anyway?

Worry. Worry.

Tele-Sex Encourages Brain Play


Digital foreplay
start their
is

a wonderfully natural

way

for

two people

to

mating dance.
use the

You may wonder why we


communication
via

word

natural to describe

phone-linked computers. Actually, almost every animal species has developed distance-courting, tele-arousal signals to pave the way for the eventual sweaty, writhing contact
of genital sex and the ejaculation of sperm. Insects telecommunicate their sexual desires with amazing
gusto. Every
little

on a hot

summer

how

he'd like

you hear scraping his violin-string wings telling the neighborhood ladies exactly night to do it to them. The horny boy cicada is talking
cricket
is

directly to the brain of the

neighborhood

girls.

The chemical
five miles

scents called

pheromones of the female dog


bitch smells, looks,

in

heat are like telephone messages telling every lusty male within

how

the horny

young

and

tastes.

281

TIMOTHY LEARY
The
And how about
Birds and the Bees

Do

It

the bird-songs as a

compelUng way

for arousing

sexual desire? At the right time of year, usually in the spring, the male song-bird's body swells with testosterone: the male sex hor-

mone. He bursts into song. He sends a long-distance, matingdating message which is picked up by every female in the neighborhood. The song boots up the sex circuits in the female's
brain and she suddenly starts thinking about how nice it would be to have a lusty guy around to nibble her willing neck and
stroke her soft, feathered body with his wings and climb on top with his wiry, strong, warm body and open her up with his straining hard modem and make her feel just the way her brain tells

her a young "bird" should

feel in the springtime.

Astonishing Evidence About Neuro-Tumescence


Fernando Nottebohm and
his colleagues at Rockefeller University

have recently announced a discovery that "shakes the conventional wisdom of brain science Nerve cells in birds go through of birth and death ... At the time of hormonal giant cycles
.
.

changes, the brain anatomies change. The specific portion of the forebrain responsible for singing, which is large in the spring,

becomes half

as large in the

fall.

"Furthermore, talented canary singers have larger specialized


regions than those

deemed

less talented."
is

In other words, the brain

a sexual organ

which can swell and

subside like the pink

membranes of

penis and vagina.

And

the

steamy brain gets turned on by compatible signals. And the song birds who can give "good phone" grow bigger brains! What an
advertisement for quantum-sex!

282

Cybersex

Telephone Sex

Come
come

to think of

it,

telecommunicated sexual messages have be-

a standard courting technique in industrial-urban societies

where boys and girls don't get to meet and look each other over around the village square.

How

do

city kids get to

know

each other,

test

each other out

as mating partners?

The use of

the telephone by the courting ad-

an inevitable step in human evolution. Q-Sex is just adding a new dimension to the conversation of good, honest boyolescents
is

girl lust.

Computer

talk

is

a direct

way

of turning on the teenage

circuits of

our brains.

The Cybernetics

of the Adolescent Brain

At the onset of puberty, new circuits of our brains activate. The human body undergoes a sudden change, almost as dramatic as
the metamorphosis from caterpillar to butterfly.
All sorts of

new bumps and protuberances emerge on the young

nubile body. Breasts begin to swell and strain to be caressed. The little worm-penis of the schoolboy grows into a swelling, red tube

of incorrigible desire. New circuits of the brain suddenly turn on, flooding the body

with impetuous hormones and hot mating becomes obsessed with sex.
Psychologists
tell

juices.

The teenager

us that the teenager thinks of sex several times an hour. Involuntary erections strain the jeans of the embarrassed
currents of desire lash the body of the perturbed She screams at rock stars and swoons over the pinyoung lady.
lad.

Hot steamy

ups of handsome movie


Let's face
it,

stars.

teenagers are often coarse, crude, and insensitive

283

TIMOTHY LEARY
to the delicate needs of others. In the desperate grip of passion,

they trip over themselves and hurt each others' feelings. That's w^here electronic foreplay comes in.

Cyberfucking and Electronic Foreplay


Teenagers use any means possible to turn on and channel their
sexual drives. Boys study magazines like Hustler, letting the pictures

and the

text trigger off their imaginations. Girls devour

mag-

azines about rock stars

and movie

actors.

The

pictures activate

the swelling "sex" areas of the brain.


birds?

Remember

the horny song-

Moralists

condemn

solitary sex

and

try to suppress erotic-

aesthetic publications v^hich people use to trigger off their imag-

and boot up the "sex areas" in their brain. The Moral Majority gets convenience stores to ban Penthouse. Playboy, and
inations

Hustler.

Ear-Sex

in

the Confessional Box

When

v^as a teenager in the


in

warned

dark ages of the 1930s, v^e v^ere the sex manuals that masturbation caused nervousness,

mental breakdown, and eventual brain damage.

The Catholic Church was pursuing its insane policy of stamping out genital pleasure and preventing the "sex areas" of my brain from swelling. I remember the kinky conversations in the confessional box.
I

would kneel

in the

dark booth and whisper through the screen


I

into the invisible ear:

"Forgive

me

Father,

am

guilty of

impure thoughts,."

"Which impure thoughts, my son?" "I thought about making love to my cousin Margaret because
284

Cybersex

of her dimpled knees, and to Dr. O'Brien's wife because she

is

blond and has big boobs, and to Clara Bow, and to all the members of the chorus line of the Radio City Rockettes, and to a girl
I

saw on

the bus ..."

"That's enough, son." Father Cavenaugh sighed. "Have you used any sinful books or magazines?" "Yes, Father. Spicy Detective, Spicy Adventure. Spicy Western.

Film Fun. Captain

Bathing Beauties.

Whiz Bang Joke Book. Hollywood Starlets.''


Billy's

Atlantic City

"Enough, enough!" cried the flustered Priest. "Such books and magazines are occasions of sin. You must destroy them."
"Yes, Father."

save five

And as your penance, Hail Mary's." This whispered "tell and listen" ritual did little to prevent the "sex areas" of my brain from growing. Might as well try to stop
"Now,
say a heartfelt Act of Contrition.
Father's

Our

and

five

the testosterone-drenched songbirds from singing!

Confessions were heard by bored or sex-tortured priests because it was their only erotic contact. They obviously got off

on

it.

In a way,

we

sinners
in the

by kneeling there

were giving the Good Fathers aural sex dark box, whispering our sweet, little,

warm, open trembling ear of the Priest. Teenagers today spend hours on the phone joking and flirting because it's a safe and calm way to explore erotic interests withdirty secrets into the

out being swirled into grappling scenes. They stimulate each other's imaginations, exploring and experimenting with erotic signals.

285

TIMOTHY LEARY
Cyber-Vamps: Telephone
The telephone sex
of brain-sex.
Sandi's

Call Girls

call services advertised in the

zines like Hustler are another step

forward

in the art

back of magaand science


me!
rub

Phone Sex ad
I

invites

you to "Talk

dirty to

I'll

my
you

nipples hard.

w^ant to

cum
"I'll

with your phone fantasies."


spread myself wide open and give

Anal Annabelle promises


all

of me, Big Boy."

"Beg for it!" says Mistress Kate. "I know what you deserve." "Climax with me! I'm hot, wet, and waiting!" murmurs Lisa.

Immoral Exchange of Electrons?


Maybe
you've
felt

that this stuff


is

is

a bit kinky. Perhaps

you

felt

that telephone call-girl sex

a masturbation aid for lonely people

with low self-esteem.

Maybe

not.

The moralists and

spoilsports

want us

to feel guilty

about phone

sex. Bureaucratic cyborgs are automatically offended

by any frivolous, hedonic, dilettante use of technology for personal delight. Phones are leased to us by Ma Bell to help us be-

come

better citizens

and to

call

home

at holidays.
if

Actually, the neuro-phone-sex-link,

touch-tone, can be a wonderful way to learn


skilled at Tele-Fucking.

employed with a light how to become

Tapping the Erotic Memory Banks


The
archives of our brains carry electric

memories of our

earliest

teenage passions.

286

Cybersex

So
will?

why

not retrieve them, turn them on, and enjoy them at

The

trick

is this:

You

learn

how

to format your brain to receive


activate

the cues, the sensory signals

which

your horniest sixteenit

year-old memories. You can use a telephone call service or do

with a friend. Ask

her-or-him to whisper to you the coded names and phrases of your first crushes. The songs of your heating season of rut.

Do you
circuits

see

what you

are doing? Booting

up your adolescent
are performing a

with the teenage access codes.

You

neuro-linguistic experiment.

You

are executing a self-hypnotic


to

age-regression.

You

are

"commanding" your own brain

expand the "sex areas."

The Brain

as Sexual

Organ

Now here

is some good news: Your brain is apparently eager to oblige. Your brain wants to be stimulated, opened up,

caressed, jacked-

into by a sure mind.

Your brain
If

hates boredom.

month
For

you keep your brain repeating the same old reality-tape, after month, your brain will sigh and give up on you. Just

like a neglected lover.

many

people, Cybersex, using the telephone or computer


is

to arouse the Brain,

easier than

running around

like a

horny

robot, pulling clothes off and on, jumping in and out of sacks

with strangers. Unless you are incredibly cool and poised,


ficult,

it's dif-

partner imagination and then start acting it out, while at trying to master the private signals that turn his-or-her brain on.

on a

first

date, to teach a

new

how

to turn

on your the same time

287

TIMOTHY LEARY
Computer Simulations
Cybersex
is

a relaxed

way

of learning

how

to explore this
is

brand

new

frontier of Cyber-Course.

The computer

a wonderful ap-

pliance for simulations and "as if" experiments.

The

hottest

sell-

ing software in the hobbyist market is simulation games. Flight Simulation lets you practice take-offs and landing. Submarine

Commander:
simulations

act out the Battle of the

North

Atlantic.

Wall

Street

let

you

pretend you're a hot shot broker.

Now

if it's

alright to use software to simulate war,

why

is it

not okay to simulate the most important game of all? Why not get on-line and link up with the brain of your partner? Murmur teenage sweet nothings into her brain-ROM? Stick your
floppy disk in his cerebral software and whisper exactly the things he wants to hear?
Simulation: You are back again in your parent's house flirting with your high school crush! And while you are taking advantage of your parent's absence by disporting naked in the rumpus room
of your cerebellum, give yourself

some
first

credit.

You

are a neuro-

sexual pioneer!

You belong

to the

generation of your species

to use your magnificent brain as a sexual organ.

Without

guilt.

With healthy
the

curiosity.

And

a desire to please

your Cyber-Mate.

Cybersex

uses

powerful

instruments

of

knowledge-

processing and communication to perform the most important task of this stage of human evolution.

Learning To Use Your Head for Your Pleasure or Profit

Own

You

are learning

how

to use your head.

288

Cybersex

To take over the programming of your bored brain. Surfing your own brain waves. Cybersex and Brain Fucking could be a key to
freedom and growth.

you don't use your head for your own pleasure and ment and education, and growth, who will?
If

entertain-

289

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Prelude to Nothing

A Drama

in

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Multi-Level Measurement of Personality

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della

Leary, Director: Kasier Foundation Psychology Research

With the collaboration of Lane, Apfelbaum,


Psychological Consultation Service, Berkeley

Cioppa, and Kaufman

1957
Interpersonal Diagnosis of Personality

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The Ronald

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Company,

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York

1964
The Psychedelic Experience A Manual Based on the Tibetan Book of the Dead Timothy Leary, Ph.D., Ralph Metzner, Ph.D., Richard Alper, Ph.D. University Books

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Start

Your

Own

Religion

League

for Spiritual Discovery, Millbrook,

NY

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High
Priest

An NAL
The

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New York

GP

Politics of Ecstacy Putnam's Sons, New York

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Jail

Notes

Introduction by Allen Ginsberg

The World Publishing Company,


Declaration of Evolution

New York

League for Spiritual Discovery Mystic Arts Press, Laguna Beach,

CA

"The Eagle Brief" Supreme Court of the United

States

Timothy

Leary versus the State of California

City Lights, San Francisco,

CA

1973
Confessions of a

Hope Fiend
York

Bantam Books,
Starseed:

New

Psi-Phi

Comet Tale

Transmitted from Folsom Prison by Timothy Leary Level Press, San Francisco

Neurologic Joanna and Timothy Leary Level Press, San Francisco

292

Bibliography

1974
The Curse of the Oval
Illustrated

Room

Introduction by Dick Gregory

by

High Times
Terra II

Press,

YOSSARIAN New York

The Starseed Transmission


Grace Company, San Francisco

1976 What Does WoMan Wantf


(Adventures Along the Schwartzchild Radius) 88 Books

1977
Neuropolitics

The Sociobiology of Human Metamorphosis Timothy Leary with Robert Anton Wilson and George A. Koopman
Peace Press, Los Angeles

1979
Intelligence Agents Peace Press, Los Angeles

The

Peace Press-Starseed Presents

The Game of Life


Real-ized by

Timothy Leary
24 Stages of Your Neurological Tarot Scripts by Robert Anton Wilson

Directed by Covert Activities


Starring the
Historical

and Scholarly

Edited by Arel Lucas

Adapted from a Musical Comedy by Barbara Leary Peace Press, Los Angeles

1982
Changing

My

Mind,

Among

Other Things

Lifetime Writings selected and Introduced by the Author


Prentice-Hall, Inc.,

New Jersey
293

Bibliography

1983
Flashbacks

An Autobiography
J

P Tarcher

Inc.

1986
Timothy Leary's Mind Mirror
Electronic Arts, San Mateo,

CA

1994
Chaos and Cyber Culture

Timothy Leary,
editor

editor,

Michael Horowitz, editor, Vickie Marshall associate

with guest appearance by William Gibson

Ronin Publications, Berkeley,

CA

1997
Design for Dying

Harper Collins Publishers,

New York

294

il

3.95 ($21.50 Cdn)

rhe Delicious Grace of Moving One's Hand: The Collected Sex Writings com)rlses Timothy Leary's selection of his best writing about sexuality. Culled from over

and never before collected, these essays, anecdotes, interviews on an exploration of the link between sexuality and the and nind, through Leary's views of this country's social and psychological attitudes oward sex. Humorous, prophetic, and as unconventional as the author, this book will ielight and enlighten everyone.
hirty years of writing

and lectures take readers

the young American intellectual, was totally cut off from the body and senses. Ay clothes had been obediently selected to fit the young professional image. Even
)f
I

one hundred drug sessions routinely listened to pop music, drank martinis, ate was put before me. had "appreciated" art by pushing my body around to sacred places," but this tourism had nothing to do with direct aesthetic sensation. Ay nervous system was cocooned in symbols; the event was always second-hand. Art /as an academic concept, an institution. The idea that one should live one's life as work of art had never occurred to me. After we took psilocybin, sat on the couch
ifter
I

^hat

n Flora Lu's Elysian


lirect

chamber,

letting

my

right cerebral

hemisphere slowly open up to

sensual reception. Flora Lu and Maynard started teaching me eroticism the of attention. Each moment was examined for sensual possibility. The delicious oga of irace moving one's hand, not as part of a learned survival sequence, but for kineshetic joy."

From the Introduction by Timothy Leary

an iconic figure of the and sexual revolutions, earned a doctorate psychology from Harvard University where he taught until 1963 when he became, with colleague Richard Alpert, the first Harvard faculty to be dismissed since Ralph Waldo Emerson. His many books Include Intelligence Agents, The Psychedelic Reader and Jail Notes.
lothy Leary (1920-1997),
jfchedelic

over art

Barnaby Hall

Photonica

ISBN 1-56025-181-6

uthor photo 1993, Curtis over design by Laura Shaw

Knapp

51395>

9'781560"251811

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